Marriage, Babies and Hatred
by anonymous23.19
Summary: It is six months after the Final Battle, Voldemort has been defeated but wizard kind is encountering a new problem - extinction. Enter a new law - a compulsory Marriage Law...
1. Kingsley's Decision

**A/N: I know that it is a much used storyline, but this is my attempt at a Marriage Law fic. Everything is canon up to a certain point - Voldemort is dead, Harry is still alive, Dumbledore, Snape and everyone else who died in the Great War is dead, except Fred because he's my favourite twin, Weasley and character and I was in tears when he died, so I am keeping him alive. Sorry.**

**It doesn't centre around one specific coupling but will show extracts of twelve different couples. They are all completely random pairings and I think there are only two canon couplings. It will show snippets of their pairings and how their relationships progress. **

**The characters used in the couplings are as follows (obviously I am not revealing the pairings yet - it would ruin the surprise) - Harry, Ron, Hermione, Draco, Blaise, Oliver, Katie, Alicia, Fred, George, Ginny, Neville, Hannah, Pansy, Percy, Angelina, Lee, Seamus, Dean, Cho, Parvati, Padma, Luna and Lavender.**

**Reviews are very welcome as is any advice or any couplings that you would like to see, I don't mind criticism as long as it's constructive. **

**Disclaimer: Harry Potter is, unfortunately, not mine. Damn.**

**_Chapter One_**

Kingsley Shacklebolt sighed deeply and leaned back heavily into his chair. Changing tack, he then leaned forward to rest his elbows on the solid mahogany desk and rest his head on his hands. A small, twitchy wizard stood in front of him, wringing his hands nervously and stuttering over his words – whether through worry about speaking to the Minister of Magic or for having to present this abominable and deeply unpopular idea, Kingsley had not yet decided. "And, so you can s-see that reinstating the M-m-marriage Law would have s-several positive benefits and would b-bring about the re-p-population of wizarding kind." The nervous wizard finished the end of his obviously rehearsed spiel. He stood awkwardly for a few moments; Kingsley took pity on him and waved his hand vaguely at the chair in front of his desk. The little man scurried forward and sat down, perching tentatively on the edge of the chair.

Kingsley sat deep in thought for a full minute, weighing up the pros and cons. The wizarding world was in turmoil – in the Great War hundreds, nay thousands had been mercilessly slaughtered, especially young people, this caused a paucity of new marriages and births. Wizard kind was at serious risk of dying out and Kingsley, as the Minister of Magic, had to find the solution. Over the past day five different ideas had been pitched to him, all equally difficult and all certain to be hated.

A tall, foreign wizard had proposed in a very pompous, accented tone to export every British wizard overseas and blend them into other wizarding societies until British wizards were a thing of the past. A witch had come up with the 'ingenious' plan of having baby wizards and witches from foreign counties adopted by British couples. Of course, aside from the small task of finding suitable babies and persuading their parents to part with them, there was the small matter that there were no couples to actually adopt said children. The third suggestion had come from an ancient wizard who had discovered a very old, very illegal spell which could give Muggles (or indeed, anyone) magical powers. Kingsley had had him thrown from his office when the man produced a female Muggle held in a cage and attempted to actually demonstrate the spell. Another bright suggestion had been to outlaw marrying Squibs because, as the witch presenting the idea had insisted, any offspring from said relationships had only a fifty percent chance of possessing magical gifts. The last was the reinstating of the Marriage Law whereby all unmarried wizards and witches aged between seventeen and thirty five would be married and would produce children.

Every single idea presented to Kingsley was flawed in some way; he had instantly discounted ending British wizarding, the sadistic spell and adopting foreign babies. He didn't quite see how banning Squib-wizard marriages was going to save the day either, there were simply not enough people entering relationships to be picky about whom they were reproducing with, and even Squibs were at least vaguely wizard kind. This only left him with one solution – Marriage Law.

"Okay." He said wearily, raising his head. The small man jumped visibly, "We're going to have to do it. The Marriage Law, I mean."

The man looked startled,"Are y-you sure?"

"It's the only solution." Kingsley replied gravely. Raising his voice, he yelled, "Weasley!"

"Yes sir?" Percy Weasley, his personal assistant, secretary and most efficient person he knew, stuck his head around the door, glasses perched on the end of his freckled nose.

"Get me the old Marriage Law files, find me five people from Wizarding Relations and get them down here quickly and I will need to see every head of department including the Unspeakables as soon as is possible, and by that I do mean today. Don't let them fob you off with excuses – I need to see them all urgently. Oh, and can you phone the Daily Prophet and get a reporter over here – not that Skeeter woman, she's awful." Kingsley reeled off instructions quickly; Percy nodded at each one before exiting silently. Kingsley could hear him scribbling memos and the quiet purr of their wings as they zoomed away.

The wizard in front of Kingsley shuffled awkwardly, drawing the Minister's attention to him. "Did you want to be part of the organisation? I can get you a job here, something advisory I think. Or you can leave. Up to you."

"I'd like to be p-part of t-things." The wizard said, shifting around in a peculiar mixture of discomfort and excitement.

A knock at the door sounded and Percy ushered in two wizards and three witches in dark purple robes with the letters "WR" emblazoned on the backs in silver. Two of them held clipboards; the others merely wore important looks.

"Hello, please sit down." Kingsley said, waving his wand and conjuring up around twenty chairs. "We'll begin when everyone else is here."

After a few minutes, everyone appeared to have arrived. A Daily Prophet reporter sat excitedly in the corner, practically quivering with joy and brandishing a Quick Quotes quill. A bored looking photographer sat next to him, fiddling sulkily with his camera and muttering under his breath about 'blasted security'. From this, Kingsley deduced that the security wizards had dismantled his camera – security was a big issue at the moment, several of Voldemort's supporters were still at large and killing left right and centre. Cornering them was dangerous; they had nothing to live for anymore and tended to kill recklessly. Yet another worry to add to Kingsley's mounting list of problems that had to be dealt with.

"Okay, let us begin. As I am sure you are all well aware, there are some serious problems with the numbers of wizards at the moment. There are simply not enough children being produced to meet the numbers of wizards and witches sadly lost during the Great Battle." Kingsley began, several of the assembled gathering produced parchment and quills and began making notes. "We have decided that action needs to be taken and so, we are reintroducing the Marriage Law. All unmarried wizards and witches between the ages of seventeen and thirty-five will be coupled together. As today is the twenty-eighth of June, we will take one week to make all of the necessary arrangements; a whole new department will need to be set up and there is going to be a lot of work to do. By the fifth of July all candidates will know of their matches. We will then give them until the end of October to marry and all couples must produce offspring within the next two years. A contract will be signed by all which will be bound with enchantments that will prevent murder of a spouse, rejection of physical intimacy and divorce."

As Kingsley spoke faces grew agitated and angry, whispers echoed around the room and virtually the entire note taking had stopped. He noted this, it was not unexpected – this would be possibly the most hated law for centuries. "Any questions?"

Every hand in the room flew up. He sighed inwardly and pointed to the nearest wizard, "So, Lenny, what is your problem?"

"Well, to state the obvious, what if people don't want to?"

"There is no choice, wizard kind is on the brink of extinction, trust me when I say that this is the only choice we have left to us." Kingsley answered smoothly, trying, and failing, to keep the desperation from his voice.

The man nodded, clearly not satisfied with his answer but perhaps beginning to realise that Kingsley did not make this decision lightly.

"Yates?" Kingsley gestured weakly at the next wizard.

"You said that all unmarried people will be matched, but what if there are already existing couples?" Kingsley recalled briefly that Yates was only twenty-seven and had a girlfriend.

"All present couplings will be taken into consideration. And, I would also advise anybody who wants to marry their current partner, does so immediately. That way there will be no issues with different couplings." He glanced up at the reporter who was scribbling furiously and had tiny ink spatters on the end of his nose.

Slowly, Kingsley made his way through all of the questions covering everything from contraceptives (banned), cheating (technically frowned upon although personally Kingsley didn't see a problem with it – especially if it produced kids) and personal preferences (posed by a younger wizard from Wizarding Relations who apparently had a thing for blondes, answer: unfortunately, not something that could be factored into the matches). The sky slowly darkened outside and the meeting drew to a close.

Disgruntled wizards and witches filed out, the reporter practically jumping for joy and already planning tomorrow's headlines out loud.

Percy stood by the door and cleared his throat; Kingsley looked up moodily, "Yes?"

"I'll just be leaving now, if that's okay?" Percy said hesitantly.

Kingsley nodded.

"Can I tell my family about the law? Or do I have to wait until tomorrow? Because, well, I have four siblings at home who will be affected by this law and well, frankly, I'd like to let them know."

Kingsley nodded again. "They'll find out soon enough anyway, just…try and make it seem like I'm not the bad one."

Percy half smiled, realised Kingsley was being serious and left. Kingsley slumped into his chair and wondered what he had done and what implications it was going to have for British wizards.


	2. Hogwarts

**Disclaimer: I still do not own Harry Potter. **

**_Chapter Two_**  
McGonagall stood up slowly, the babble of outraged and angry noise faded gradually, incensed whispers still echoing around the Great Hall. "All students who are seventh years will need to remain in the Great Hall today; you will be missing your first lessons of the day." She sat down heavily, frowning unhappily.

Madam Pomfrey leaned across to murmur soothingly at her, "You can't do anything to help Minerva. Everything will be fine; some of them might even enjoy it." Around her, the other professors nodded their agreement through mouthfuls of toast and pumpkin juice.

Finally, the bell rang and the younger students dispersed to their various lessons, the teachers disappearing as well, leaving McGonagall and the very unhappy seventh year students.

She stood up again, every head turned to look at her, hoping that she had a solution. She didn't. "As you are all aware, the Marriage Law will affect every single one of you in here. Unfortunately, I cannot do anything to prevent the marriages. I have tried to persuade the Minister but he insists that the Marriage Law cannot have exceptions." Her lips grew dangerously thin. "He has also decreed that-" She paused and half whispered the next word, wincing with distaste "conjugal- chambers will have to be constructed in the castle or the grounds so that those of you who are married have somewhere to go. Also, anyone whose spouse does not attend Hogwarts will be Flooed in twice a week for compulsory visits."

At her words, the collective shoulders of every student slumped miserably – their last chance had failed them.

She continued in a much brighter tone than she was feeling, "Today, you will all receive the names of your partners. Hogwarts is going to be used as a meeting point today where all participants in this law will receive an owl with the name of their partner on. This means that those of you who will have partners outside of Hogwarts will be able to talk to them today. Oh, and also, every couple has a compulsory meeting with the Ministry, the details of which will be included in your letter."

There was a loud silence flooding across the Hall – the dawning realisation that there was no way out of this law was growing on everybody. Suddenly, a loud pop made people jump. It was followed by several more and hundreds of witches and wizards began Apparating into the Great Hall.

They began filling up the empty spaces on the House benches, some of them such as Fred and George greeting Hogwarts students that they already knew. Some of them attempted happiness, others sat despairing and miserably, a few looked as if they were ready to commit suicide and a few dealt with the pressure by being irritatingly loud and annoying – Fred and George amongst this latter category.

Suddenly, a whisper of wings was heard, growing steadily louder and louder as thousands of owls flooded into the Hall, beady eyes searching for their letters' recipient before swooping down to present the missive. The Hall was dangerously silent, the tension palpable as the unwilling participants in the new legislation ripped open their letters.

A mutual howl of dissent ripped through the air, voices tearing across each other as the letters were read and partners revealed.

Loud cries of, "Oh God, not him!" and "But, I can't marry her!" filled the Hall.

"Would all prospective couples please find each other and sit together? Thank you." McGonagall's voice sounded over the clamour, magically amplified.

Hardly anyone moved, they were busy berating their new fiancées with their friends.

"So, who've you got?" Ron leaned across to Harry, a pained look on his freckled face.

"Lavender." Harry muttered.

Ron winced and clapped him on the shoulder, "Good luck mate. I've got Padma. You know, Padma Patil. She hates me." He swallowed heavily and turned to look at the twins. "What about you two?"

Fred spoke first, "Ange. That'll be okay, right Ange?"

Angelina was sat next to him; she looked shocked, slightly apprehensive but not quite as traumatised as most of the other people in the room. "Naa, it'll all be okay. God, who would have thought I'd be marrying Fred Weasley? I dunno what my mum will say."

Fred looked indignant, "I thought your mum loved me." Angelina merely laughed mockingly.

"I've got Luna Lovegood!" George cried in dismay.

Fred and Angelina looked at one another and burst into laughter. George slumped onto the bench, burying his head in his hands.

"Hello." A dreamy voice sounded, Luna stood behind George, smiling inanely.

"Oh god." George said, his voice muffled.

"Oh, be nice." Ginny snapped, nudging him with a pointed elbow, "I've got Lee."

Luna sat down daintily behind George, looking at him with concern, "Is he alright?"

No one appeared to hear her, George's head flung upward and Fred and he spoke in menacing unison, "You mean… our mate Lee is marrying our baby sister?"

Ginny nodded gleefully. "Yup. And there's absolutely nothing you can do about it."

"The contract we sign merely prevents spouses from killing one another; there is nothing in it about older brothers murdering their younger sister's fiancée." Fred informed her.

"I'm with Zabini." Hermione said quietly, her face a mask of despair. "He's a bloody Slytherin."

"Oh god, and his mother is one of those old-fashioned types, they'll try and stop you working Hermione. He's looking for a trophy bride." Ginny sympathised, throwing an arm around her friend's shoulders. Hermione swallowed heavily several times, struggled to hold in her wave of emotion and gave up – dissolving into tears.

"I don't suppose any of you know who…" Percy paused to look down at his letter, "Cho Chang is?"

Harry and Ron exchanged looks. "Yeah, she's Ravenclaw. Dead clever, dated that Cedric Diggory for a while. And erm…she's Harry's ex." Ron replied.

Percy looked alarmed – his eyebrows raising dramatically and disappearing in his red hair. Harry laughed, "She's okay, honestly. You'll probably like her."

Seamus and Parvati wandered over, hand in hand and wearing matching blissful smiles. "We were matched." Parvati announced happily, "We're so happy. We thought we might not be put together."

"That's good then." Ginny said, slightly sarcastically.

Parvati seemed not to notice, "I know, isn't it?" She paused and her voice took on its typical gossipy tone, "Guess what? Hannah and Neville are matched, everyone thinks that Augusta had something to do with it, I mean everyone knows that they were perfect for each other."

"Wow, that's amazing!" Ginny grinned and looked about the Hall, finally spying Neville smiling shyly at Hannah. Finally, a good side to the Law – Hannah and Neville were the perfect couple; they just needed a little push to get them together, something that the Law had provided.

"And, you'll never guess who Dean has got? That Pansy Parkinson girl, honestly, she looks like a pug. He's so unhappy about it!" Parvati continued delightedly, obviously she had taken it upon herself to distribute news of as many of the couplings as possible.

Suddenly, Katie Bell ran over to George and flung herself between the twins, tears streaming down her face.

"Katie?" Fred said worriedly.

"What's wrong?" George asked, frowning with concern.

"Draco Malfoy! He's my h-h-usb-band. He's j-just been utterly f-foul to me." She sobbed.

"Oh god." George said, hugging her. Fred turned to look at the Slytherin table, Draco had his eyes fixed on Katie, a disgusted expression in his face. He looked away and began talking to Zabini who was wearing a pained look and muttering the word 'Mudblood'. Hermione cried harder.

"It's okay." Fred reassured her, "You can appeal against the Law, they can change it for you."

"Really?" Katie asked hopefully.

"Yeah." Fred said, far more confidently that he felt. Swapping partners would be a difficult and time consuming business, the Ministry would not be changing any of these couplings.

"Oliver!" Harry cried suddenly, spying his former Quidditch captain in the throng of people.

"Alright Harry?" Oliver said amiably, striding toward the small group. "Guess what? I'm with Alicia."

"Damn, I wanted Spinnet." George moaned, "I've got that." He gestured to Luna who was waving her arms around wildly and muttering to herself.

"What is she doing? Is she alright?" Oliver asked, torn between amusement and apprehension.

"Probably seen some Nargles." Ginny said knowledgeably.

This was too much for everyone, the whole group burst into laughter, forgetting for a light hearted moment their troubles and prospective spouses.

**A/N: This is probably the last group chapter, I will now be showing individual couplings including some weddings (obviously, not every couple will have their wedding described because it would get boring), possibly some arguments and a few Ministry meetings. If you have any requests for a specific couple to go first then let me know!**


	3. Oliver and Alicia 1

**A/N: natalie211 requested an Oliver/Katie chapter so here it is... I'd like this story to be based around requests, so if you want to see a pairing them send me a message or put it in a review. Thanks (:**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

**_Chapter Three_**

Oliver Wood and Alicia Spinnet  
Ministry of Magic Meeting

"Welcome to the Ministry of Magic. Marriage Law Offices are located on the third floor." A dark haired welcome witch said professionally, pointing at the lifts to her left.

Alicia and Oliver nodded and climbed into the cramped lift. A small man holding a thick roll of posters dropped it onto Oliver's toe and then apologising profusely, exited promptly on the next floor. Oliver glowered menacingly at his retreating figure and Alicia exploded into giggles.

"That's not funny, Alicia." Oliver said, "If I had been hurt it could ruin my Quidditch career."

Alicia laughed harder, the genuine serious note in Oliver's tone proving too much for her to take straight faced. Oliver sent her a menacing glare.

"Third floor." A cool voice announced and the pair walked into a brightly lit corridor.

It was long and punctuated with dark wood doors culminating in a large open space at the very end, a welcome witch in emerald green robes (the new fashion – intended to match the Chosen One's eye colour) with a gleeful, slightly malicious smile and a towering stack of files sat at a large desk. Behind her was a waiting area decorated with colourful posters with marriage related slogans (Keep your marriage strong – see our counsellor!) and a leafy potted plant. Several couples with unhappy expressions, and one blissfully happy pairing who were displaying their love for one another by attempting to swallow the others' face, sat in the area.

"Hello there and welcome to the Marriage offices! My name is Belinda. And you are?" The welcome witch announced brightly, she seemed to revel in the sheer stench of despair and unhappiness that lingered in the room.

"I'm Oliver Wood. And this is Alicia." Oliver said.

"Right then," Belinda waved her wand lightly and a file neatly dislodged itself from the pile and landed in her hands. She opened it, smirked and then turned back to the pair. "Yes, your initial appointment is with a Mr. M. Isery, it is at 10:40am but we are running approximately twenty minutes behind. Please, take a seat and wait for your names to be called." She turned away, effectively dismissing them and began flicking through a copy of Witch Weekly emblazoned with several pictures of new celebrity 'couplings' including a large image of Harry with a smaller one of Lavender.

Oliver and Alicia took seats, side by side. An uncomfortable silence fell over the waiting area. After half an hour a voice announced, "Oliver Wood and Alicia Spinnet, room twelve please."

"It's about halfway down the corridor." Belinda interjected helpfully as the pair walked past the desk.

Room twelve was tiny. Inside was crammed a desk overflowing with papers, two filing cabinets, two spindly chairs in front of the desk and a tiny console table on which stood three empty photo frames, its inhabitants obviously having grown bored of their surroundings.

A bespectacled and harassed man sat behind the desk, "Hello there, take a seat, quick quick." He muttered waving a hand at the two chairs, his nose buried in their file.

They sat promptly and the man launched into an obviously well rehearsed spiel, "As you are well aware you two have been paired together. You must be married by the end of October. This gives you just under two months. There are a few arrangements that need to be made. Firstly you will need to sign a magical contract. You will be given the time to do this later. Next, the Ministry must be sent word of your wedding day. Thirdly, I have to go over the erm-physical arrangements. You must have relations at least twice a week, contraceptives in any form are banned and the contract will bind you into this…arrangement. We would like you to produce children as quickly as possible, as you, Miss – err-," he paused to consult the folder, "Spinnet are re-taking your final year at Hogwarts, you do not have to actually get pregnant until you are out of full time education. You, Mr Wood, is it? Well, you will be Flooed into the Hogwarts building twice a week and the two of you will be given an err-bedroom chamber for your own use. Any questions? No? Good, thank you. Now, if you just go n-"

Oliver interjected suddenly, "Well, what if we don't want to get married? Or do any of that other stuff? I mean, no offence Alicia, but I don't exactly want to have sex with her. I mean she's only eighteen – it's practically illegal. And anyway, we don't even really know each other."

"Then I suggest that you two schedule your wedding for late October to give yourselves a chance to get to know one another. I must inform you Mr Wood that actually Miss Spinnet is perfectly legal. Also, the contract will increase your liking for one another in the more…physical sense." The man replied, slightly flustered at all the mentions of sex.

"But, I don't want to!" Alicia yelled, jumping to her feet, "I'm eighteen! I want to do my own thing, I want to travel and see the world, I want to make my own choices and fall in love with who I want to. I don't want any of this." She sank despairingly into her chair and buried her head in her hands.

Oliver shot her a concerned look, the man looked at him pointedly, "It's your fiancée." He reminded Oliver gently.

"Yeah, she is, but not through choice. Me and Lissy have been friends for a while but neither of us wanted to get married. I mean, I'm not ready to be someone's husband or a father. None of us are."

"I'm sorry." The man said honestly, pushing his glasses up his thin nose nervously, "Really, I am but there is nothing I can do about this. The Ministry's decision is final."

Alicia broke into loud sobs. Oliver bent down on the floor next to her, "Hey," he said carefully, placing a hand on her shoulder, "No one wants this, Lissy, but we don't have a choice. I promise it won't be that bad marrying me, you can still finish Hogwarts, I don't care about that. And you can travel, this contract requires us to meet up twice a week but I'll Apparate over to wherever you are. We don't have to look on it as a proper marriage, not yet at least. It's gonna be okay."

Alicia managed a tearful half nod and the man shot up. "Okay then, I'll have to hurry you. Here is a copy of the contract, I need you to both sign it and then we can move on."

He presented one sheet of parchment to the couple.

Oliver scanned it quickly, it read, "I accept that I will marry my present match, we will be married by October. I understand and accept that we will be required to produce children as quickly as possible and will meet up with my spouse at least twice a week for physical relations. I have been informed that this contract will increase physical liking for my spouse. I also understand that this contract bans: contraceptives, cheating on my spouse, divorce, murder or physical harm against my spouse and rejection of physical intimacy."

It was short and brief – obviously the Ministry had not had much time to prepare it and had focused on making it simple and to the point rather than fancy and carefully worded. Unfortunately, Oliver could not see an obvious loophole - the Ministry had covered pretty much everything.

The man brandished a quill at them and Oliver took a deep breath and scrawled his name at the bottom of the statement. Alicia took the quill from him with a shaking hand and scribbled her signature underneath his.

"C'mon." Oliver said gently to Alicia, taking her hand, "Let's go get a coffee or something."

The man positively beamed with delight, "Yes, yes do. Bonding is a good thing!" He called after them as they exited his office and made their way back to the lift.


	4. Draco and Katie 1

**A/N: Here is a Katie and Draco chapter as requested by All the Pretty Horses. Next, I will probably do a HarryxLavender chapter. Please, let me know about any requests you have, otherwise I will just work through the ones that haven't been done yet.**

**Disclaimer: Bla bla bla, I don't own Harry Potter. *grins evilly* Yet.**

**_Chapter Four_**

Ministry of Magic meeting  
Katie x Draco

"What do you mean this pairing is permanent?!" Draco yelled, slamming his fist down angrily on the desk. It buckled slightly under the strain and several papers fell onto the navy carpeted floor.

The little man visibly paled, recoiled a few inches and pushed his glasses up his nose nervously. "I'm v-very sorry but the Ministry's decision is f-final." He stuttered apologetically.

Malfoy shot him an evil glare, "Then I am afraid that there has been some sort of mistake, my father will be in touch." He rose fluidly to his feet and shot a disgusted look at Katie whose face seemed to be permanently frozen in a mixture of despair and loathing. "I am leaving."

"You're father will be in touch?" Katie said scornfully appearing to wake from her trance and glaring at him, "You're father is in Azkaban!" She laughed maliciously. "What's he gonna do? Who even cares what he says anyway? No one, no one does. You're nothing anymore, Malfoy. Nothing. And I am not marrying you. Ever."

She stood up gracefully and swept majestically from the room. Malfoy looked slightly impressed - he did like his women feisty. "She'll be a Malfoy yet." He told the man confidently. "No woman rejects a Malfoy. Ever. We'll be back to sign the contract next week." Draco left the room, speeding up slightly to reach Katie's side.

Time to turn on the old Malfoy charm, he lowered his voice a fraction and pasted a lazy half smile across his face – a formula which always worked. "So, Bell, seeing as how we're stuck together, how about we make it more … enjoyable." He paused suggestively, letting his eyes roam over her body.

She looked faintly nauseous. "Back off, Malfoy, I'm not sleeping with you."

"Did I say that?" He replied, a hint of a smirk playing arrogantly on his cold features.

"The implications were pretty clear. Now, go away, I'm going to find my actual friends where I will tell them the terrible news and consider committing suicide." She smiled sweetly and walked away.

The words sunk in slowly and Draco followed her again, his longer legs giving him some advantage over her. "Oh, come on, Katie. It's not going to be that bad and there is nothing we can bloody do about it. We're gonna get married. We don't have a choice. So, how about we go for a meal or something tomorrow?"

Katie looked thoughtful for a brief second, "No." She said simply, walking into the lift.

Draco stepped in, "Fine, be like that. You'll change your mind, Katie. They all do."

Katie laughed. "Not likely, Malfoy. And don't call me Katie, only my friends call me that."

"But, Katie darling, I am not your friend. I am your fiancée. Although, if you would prefer, we can come up with a pet name." He raised an eyebrow, smiling slightly.

"No, you are not my fiancée and no, I do not want a 'pet name'. I didn't sign the contract and I never will. You are just – well, you're nothing to me really." She tossed her hair scornfully over one shoulder and spent the remainder of the journey with her eyes fixed firmly on the wall.

"So, fiancée, what sort of ring would you like?" Malfoy continued irritatingly, striding through the lobby with her as if he owned the place.

"An invisible one." Katie growled through gritted teeth, her hands clenching into fists by her sides.

Draco's grey eyes noticed this and he stifled a laugh. "So, I'm thinking emeralds in a silver band, Slytherin colours you see. And Malfoy colours as well really, you'd better get used to it. There's a lot of silver and green at home, darling."

Katie made a violent noise in the back of her throat, a faint angry red flush creeping over her cheeks. "I will not ever live with you."

"All Malfoy brides live in the Malfoy Mansion, you silly pet, of course you will live with me. Mother will be there as well and Father when he returns. We'll be such a happy family. You'll love it, the house is pretty grand. Malfoy brides go short of nothing."

"No, we really won't. Your mother will be a stuck up, Pureblood bitch and your father will be an old, common criminal. Your house is well known as being the place where You-Know-Who stayed, you actually allowed him into your home! The Malfoy name is completely tarnished, don't you see? The looks people give you – they aren't respect or fear or submission, they're disgust and scorn. I've already told you Malfoy, you and your father, you're finished. Everyone knows the truth about you - your father is in Azkaban, you've been branded with the Dark Mark, your father paid for you to be kept out of prison. All you have left is money. The Malfoy name - it's over." She ranted, her dark eyes flashing.

Draco watched it all lazily, "My mother is not a bitch, she just has high standards and I'll have you know that she actually saved the 'Chosen One's' life. Father will be fine with you because you're Pureblood but really you need a little educating in Pureblood etiquette for him to truly accept you. Oh yes, and some new clothes, those old rags are just," he paused to mock shudder as if in disgust. "And, darling, soon you will be a Malfoy – Katie Malfoy – has a nice ring to it don't you think?" He added, his eyes flashing mischievously.

Katie shuddered. "I would prefer to boil in oil before taking your name."

"Honestly, my dear, you won't have a lot of choice. The Ministry gave you a chance to sign the contract, in fact, seeing as how it's me and all, they're giving you another one, a freebie if you will. And then, they force you to sign them. It would be so much easier if you stopped fighting me and the Ministry and just put your name on the contract." Draco explained patiently, as if talking to an idiot. Smiling inwardly, he stepped closer to her and wrapped an arm around her waist. She froze on the spot, a combination of shock and hatred rendering her unable to move any further.

Her words were slow and vaguely menacing, "If you want to keep that arm, I would let go of me. Immediately."

Draco chuckled arrogantly and took the offending arm off of her, "If you wish, dear. Although, when you sign the contract and arm around the waist will be the least of your worries. If I recall, the exact wording is 'the contract will increase physical liking for one another'. Looks like you'll be really quite attracted to me when you put your signature on the parchment." He leered at her; she squeezed her eyes tightly shut as if by closing them and then re-opening them, he would somehow have disappeared. He hadn't.

By now the quarrelling pair had stepped into Muggle London, several passers-by shot them curious glances – both were still clad in wizarding robes.

"Oh just leave me alone!" Katie yelled finally, exasperated.

Draco raised an eyebrow – he did love a challenge and this was going to be a big one. He knew one thing though; Katie Bell would become his wife, one way or another.


	5. Harry and Lavender 1

**A/N: A HarryxLavender chapter, as requested by natalie211. Please keep requests (and reviews) coming in, I want to write about the characters you want to read about!**

**Disclaimer: I still do not own Harry Potter, J. does.**

**_Chapter Five_**

Harry x Lavender  
Madam Puddifoots

Lavender sat at her vanity table, carefully brushing her long hair. Suddenly, a handsome tawny owl flew to her window; it tapped gently on the glass with its beak.

She rose to take the letter it bore.

"Lavender, I was wondering whether you wanted to get a coffee or something and talk over the dreaded wedding plans. I know you'll know what you want – probably a lot better than I will, so I'll probably leave a lot of it down to you.

Harry"

She reached for a scrap of parchment and wrote a reply in her tidy, curling handwriting, "Harry, you're absolutely right; I have had my dream wedding planned since I was nine! I'd love to get a coffee – how about I Apparate over to yours about eleven? Lavender" She read it over twice, ensuring that it did not display too much enthusiasm yet seemed welcoming and pleased to be asked out.

Lavender had learned much from her previous, and disastrous, relationship with Ron Weasley. Now, she let the men do the running, maintaining a calm yet affectionate façade and allowing no one to get under her skin. This way she held the interest of the wizard in question and ensured that she did not get hurt the way she had been by Ron. She had made herself a promise that she, Lavender Brown, would never cry over any man ever again.

She handed the reply to the owl who looked at her reproachfully through wide, amber eyes. Tutting, she threw the owl a treat who squawked in gratitude and soared away into the blue, cloudless sky.

She barely had time to change her dress (into a rose pink one – she was the Chosen One's fiancée, therefore, she reasoned wearing an emerald green dress would look, quite frankly, rather pathetic) and arrange her hair before the owl was back, bearing a reply. "Lavender, you stay there, I'll Apparate to your flat at eleven. Harry"

Lavender smiled slightly – Harry was a gentleman. Every decent witch knew that she was never supposed to Apparate to the house of the wizard for a date, he must come to hers, always.

At eleven on the dot, a knock sounded at the door, Harry stood outside carrying a small bunch of pink roses.

"For you." He said awkwardly, passing her the posy.

"Thank you!" She cried, waving her wand to conjure up a glass vase, she spent a brief minute arranging the flowers in the vase and then sent it back into her flat. "Shall we - err- go then?" She berated herself for her clumsy words, she needed to sound polished and not overly eager and most definitely not uncomfortable.

"Oh yeah." Harry agreed, his hands dug deep in his jeans pockets. She noted his causal dress with some trepidation, wondering if he even possessed a suit for formal dates.

They walked in uncomfortable silence out of the block of flats and into Diagon Alley.

"Madam Puddifoot's?" Lavender finally broke the silence to ask.

Harry nodded – a sinking sensation rising up inside of him, he detested the little café, it held some bad memories for him. He hoped that this visit would not end as his terrible date with Cho had.

Once inside, he ordered a pot of tea and some cupcakes frosted in pale pink which Lavender insisted were simply 'divine' and that he would 'positively adore'. Harry doubted very much that he would ever 'positively adore' anything and sent a fervent wish to the heavens that Lavender's way of speaking would not rub off on him.

"So," he began, "the wedding…what do you want?"

Lavender grinned widely, "Well, a traditional church wedding because my mum is a Muggle and I want to invite my Muggle relations as well, everyone we'll invite will obviously know that I am a witch but I want to tone down a lot of the magical aspects. I want a big, white dress. Parvati will be my chief bridesmaid. I want a horse drawn carriage to take us to the church. I want a proper honeymoon; I'm thinking somewhere sunny, possibly a Muggle resort because they tend to be a lot nicer than typical wizarding ones. The colour scheme will be white, gold and a touch of pink. Obviously, you will wear a tux, not white though because that's very tacky." She paused to draw breath before adding hastily, "Oh, and I don't want Ron to attend."

"No. That's impossible." Harry stated flatly. "Ron is my best mate. He'll be my best man and probably godfather to our first child, if we have one. And Hermione will definitely be part of the plans as well. And all of the Weasleys will all be attending and Molly will probably want to help as mother-of-the-groom because as you well know, my mum is dead and she's the closest thing I've got."

Lavender's nose wrinkled slightly. "Look, there's so much history between me and Ron, it would be too awkward. I don't care about any of the others – Hermione will be acceptable, I was thinking of asking Ginny to be a bridesmaid anyway and of course, Molly will want to help out. But, I don't want Ron there."

"Lavender, this is difficult and awkward enough as it is." Harry said through gritted teeth. "I'm being forced into a marriage which I do not want and I know you don't either. Obviously, you love the fact that I'm all famous now and stuff and you'll want Witch Weekly or something to cover our wedding, you don't mind this marriage because of the status symbol."

"Well yes of course." Lavender said simply, sipping her tea delicately. "Who wouldn't want to marry the Chosen One? You're the saviour of the wizarding world, Harry, you know hundreds of witches offered bribes to be your bride? I know you have money enough for me to live as I want to, I know you'll let me have my big, white wedding and I know that I have absolutely no choice and so I'll just have to –" Her voice shook slightly and she dropped her gaze to stare at her lap, "make the best of the situation."

"You know, we can fight this law. If we just get married, everyone does as the Ministry says, well then when they think everything is all peaceful we can rebel against it. If enough of us sign a petition or something, you know, take action, well I think we can get it overturned. And then the two of us can part on good terms and both find true love." Harry said, his eyes flashing with excitement. It was clear he had spent a lot of time thinking about this plan.

"Divorce." Lavender said bleakly, "You'd divorce me." Crocodile tears shimmered in her blue eyes.

"Well, yeah." Harry replied weakly, slightly flustered at the fake tears. He wondered what was appropriate behaviour in this situation – act like nothing was happening? A comforting hand on her shoulder accompanied with various lying pleasantries? A loving hug and a fervent promise never to divorce her?

The cup slipped from Lavender's hands and shattered loudly on the floor causing every head in the room to turn and stare at them. Harry prayed that the floor would open up and swallow him whole. "You'd divorce me?!" She yelled, jumping to her feet, somehow managing to make even this action seem quite refined.

"Look, I don't want this!" Harry shouted back, "And you don't either, you don't love me, you don't even like me and the feeling is mutual! You can have your bloody, show off wedding, I don't care, then when this stupid law is abolished, you can keep the house, have my money, whatever, I'm gonna move away and get my own life!"

A bright flash startled both of them – a grinning photographer and eager journalist stood by the window, their noses pressed against the glass.

"Great," Harry groaned, "Now we're gonna be in the bloody paper!"

Lavender smothered a satisfied grin and then rearranged her features in a mask of hurt. "Don't you want to marry me Harry? I thought we would be perfect together!"

The journalist scribbled notes furiously; the other customers in the tea shop were watching the argument with interest.

"Don't do this now, especially not in public. Let's just part ways and I'll see you in a few days time when we've both calmed down." Harry replied shortly, walking out of the tea shop and Apparating abruptly before the paparazzi had time to reach him.

Lavender let her face slip into a disappointed and very calculated pout. Granted she had made the papers, front page if the look on the journalists' face was anything to go by, but she had entirely alienated Harry. Despite what everyone thought, Lavender genuinely did want a happy marriage, she had dreamed of true love but she would settle for marrying a rich celebrity. Although, at this rate, there would be no wedding, it was a well known fact that Harry Potter had a lot of influence at the Ministry, if he asked to be assigned a new bride, well, people would listen, high up people and she, Lavender, would be given another second-rate fiancée.

She exited the teashop, pausing to give a quick statement to the journalist (Yes, that was our very first argument, I am very sad it happened. Harry and I will be meeting up later in the week to discuss our differences and to plan our wedding.) and then making her way back home to Floo Parvati and tell her about what had happened.

**A/N: I know that Lavender comes across as a calculating bitch as this point, but let me just state why: firstly, she has been hurt and humiliated by his best friend, secondly I think she would be a bit overwhelmed by the fame (as Harry Potter is pretty much THE number one celebrity in the wizarding world) and I think that she would want to be in the papers and stuff and also in the next chapter of them, I plan on making her come across as nicer and explaining why she was so horrible in this one!**

**Keep reading!**


	6. Ron and Padma 1

**Author's Note: As requested by All the Pretty Horses and Lexxxx a Ron and Padma chapter. Enjoy, review and please keep the requests coming in - next up will be Luna and George!**

**Disclaimer: Harry Potter belongs to Jo Rowling.**

**_Chapter Six_**

RonxPadma  
Ministry of Magic meeting

"So, Miss, err," Mr Isery consulted the file which contained a brief profile on each person, a short schedule which had a list of appointments the couple were required to attend and a copy of the contract, "Patil, you want to appeal against this partnering?"

Padma nodded once and pursed her lips. "That is correct."

"Me too." Ron added, drawing his gaze away from the carpet for a moment, "I don't wanna marry her." His freckled nose wrinkled in disgust.

"I am afraid that appeals will take a very long time and the likelihood of your being assigned a new partner is very very slim. It would be better to simply reconcile your differences, see our relationship counsellor for a few weeks, go through the wedding process quickly and then with time, you should find that you will grow to like and understand the other. Who knows, you may find that you turn out to love each other." He smiled hopefully.

Padma glowered at him. The smile died quickly on his lips. "I will not marry him." She said slowly, a hint of menace in her tone.

"Yeah, and I don't wanna marry her." Ron put in helpfully.

"You have already stated that Mr Weasley, I am well aware of your concerns. There are an awful lot of Weasleys about at the moment and they all look so alike…it's all really rather confusing. It's going to be a nightmare when they are all married, twice the number in fact." The man trailed off before appearing to suddenly realise where he was and continuing hastily, "So, anyway back to the matter in hand…I would strongly advise you against an appeal, in fact at the moment the Ministry is not accepting any appeals. Instead, they are maintaining that you must marry your prospective partner and spend a minimum of three months married before an appeal can even be considered. Then there will be a lengthy observation period, regular meetings with a qualified expert and a long court battle. This does also mean that you will have to sign the contract today." He pulled the parchment from a stack on his desk with an unexpected flourish. "So, if you will sign first Mr Weasley?" He held a quill expectantly in front of Ron's face.

Ron leaned back in his chair and folded his arms across his chest. "I'm one of the bloody Golden Trio, I helped defeat Voldemort, you all owe your ruddy lives to me, are you really telling me that nothing can be done about this? I mean look at her," he waved vaguely in Padma's direction, "she's no fun, she's a Ravenclaw for god's sake, I mean it's not like we have anything in common. Why the hell would I want to marry her?"

Padma rose angrily to her feet, "No, you listen to me, Ronald Weasley, being a Ravenclaw is nothing to be ashamed of. We are a respected, highly intelligent house as compared to Gryffindor, who have contributed very little to Hogwarts as a whole."

Ron cut in; his face tinged a faint pink. "Gryffindor have done everything for Hogwarts – for a start, every member of the Golden Trio was in the house. Every Gryffindor stayed to fight in the Final Battle, half the Ravenclaws scarpered! Harry Potter was in Gryffindor, Dumbledore was in Gryffindor, every decent wizard or witch ever born has been in Gryffindor!"

"Oh, la di da, is the 'Golden Trio' all you talk about? Is that the only thing in your pathetic existence? I mean, yeah whatever you 'saved the wizarding world' and we're all very grateful but now, your time is up. You were always the useless one of the three anyway."

"What d'ya mean?" Ron yelled, his face now resembling an over ripe tomato, his shock of red hair only adding to the effect of his whole head being on fire.

"Well, Harry was the Chosen One and Hermione was the brains of the operation. I mean, they could have done without you really couldn't they?" Padma retorted with a condescending smile.

"And where were you when we were finding and destroying the Horcruxes and risking our necks every day? Relaxing at Hogwarts?"

"You know full well that being at Hogwarts was a very dangerous and terrifying experience and that we all ended up living in the Room of Requirement within the first few months!"

Mr Isery cleared his throat loudly and the quarrelling pair turned to look at him. "I am arranging for you to have some counselling, relationship counselling. I can see that this will be a…erm…fiery and passionate relationship and that you may need some advice to help you cool down."

He scribbled a note on a scrap of parchment. "Now, you are both required to sign the contract now, I am afraid."

Both looked at him in utter disbelief.

"It is Ministry orders," He said defiantly, "Too many couples have been storming out without signing the required paperwork and it is causing a huge burden on Ministry resources and they are very limited as it is. It is important that the contracts are all signed so they can be activated properly and filed away in a safe place. The weddings all need to be arranged, so that we can then ensure that there are no troublemakers attempting to duck the law and then they can be assigned a wedding date. There is much planning and organisation behind this law which many people do not realise, if they really knew how much work we have all put into this, then they would probably make less fuss about signing the contract…"

"No, people haven't signed the bloody contract because they don't want to!" Ron said loudly.

Mr Isery stopped his spiel, looking slightly dazed and confused – obviously, he was not used to being interrupted in the middle of this speech. "Obviously the Ministry accepts that this is a fairly controversial law and that there is some resistance, as was expected…"

"Some resistance?" Padma said scathingly, "There has been protests and demonstrations in the streets every day since the law was passed! There has been over a million Howlers sent to the Ministry offices! People are fleeing the country and some are even being driven to committing suicide. Is this what you call 'some resistance'? Why can't the Ministry just see how unpopular this law is? No one wants it!"

"Miss Patil, these are isolated incidents and have been dealt with appropriately…" The wizard attempted again.

"Isolated incidents? They've been happening up and down the country!" Ron interjected.

"They have been dealt with by the Ministry. Now, could we please get back to the matter in hand – this contract does have to be signed, quickly please." Mr Isery said firmly, brandishing the owl feather quill.

Ron changed tack. "Are you married, Mr Isery?"

"I don't see what business that is of yours or quite how it relates to the current situation, but yes I am." He replied, pushing his glasses further up his nose.

"And you fell in love with your wife?" Ron persisted.

Mr Isery's eyes misted over and lovesick grin crept over his face, "Well no, I do not have a wife. But yes, yes I did fall in love with my spouse. There is nothing quite like love. Absolutely nothing at all."

"So can't you see that this law is removing any chance a whole generation - a war torn, battle hardened generation who have lived through tumultuous and dangerous years, who have lost family members and friends, who have seen horrific things - this law removes any chance we have of falling in love. We need love, we need comfort, we need to be able to fall in love properly, to make decisions, after all we have seen and done and experienced don't you think that we, of all people, should be able to choose whom we fall in love with?" Padma pleaded.

He seemed to waver for a long moment, biting his bottom lip in thought, before stating wearily, "My opinion is neither relevant or of any worth."

"But, you see where we are coming from?" Ron asked.

"Well, just between the three of us, yes, yes I do." Mr Isery said with a heavy sigh, "Your generation has seen a lot, you do deserve the right to love and this law is ridiculous, but believe me when I say that the Ministry really did have no choice."


	7. Lee and Ginny 1

**A/N: Okay, this is a sort of GinnyxLee chapter, it more hints at the relationship than actually describes it. I've had this idea in my head for a long time though and it was just begging to be written, anyway, I thought it would make a nice change from all the dates and Ministry meetings. Enjoy and please, please review! **

**I also realised that I have quite a few reviews, so I just want to say thank you very much if you've reviewed, you really do make my day.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter.**

LeexGinny  
The Twins' Warning

Lee lay back on the soft grass, soaking up the sun in the obscure Muggle park he hadn't bothered to check the name of. He knew that Fred and George would never find him here. He could hear the screams of excited children, throwing themselves haphazardly over the wooden climbing frame, birds twittered merrily in the bushes and busy mothers gossiped eagerly amongst themselves. He closed his eyes, enjoying the sun's warmth. He even permitted himself a satisfied smile.

"Lee." A sudden unpleasantly familiar voice said pleasantly from his left, accompanied by a small popping sound.

To his right, the sound was heard again, drowned out slightly by a similar voice, "Thought you'd given us the slip there, didn't you?"

Lee groaned, a feeling of dread washing over him and sat up quickly. "Yeah." He said miserably, his face slipping into a pout.

"I'm disappointed. All these years of friendship, all those years of planning and pranks, he witnessed them all, even participated in some...and he still underestimates us." Fred said, his tone light and not displaying a hint of disappointment.

"You know what, Fred?" George continued, his voice still pleasant and all the more menacing for it.

"You know what, George, I think I do." Lee hated it when they pulled the whole twin thing on him. He also suspected that the twins were very aware of this fact.

"Are you thinking that we are going to have to discount all these years of friendship because our supposedly best friend has committed the unthinkable?"

"Why yes Fred, yes I am." George replied sweetly.

"Do you, Lee Jordan, admit that you are dating our baby sister, Ginevra Weasley?" Fred said. His tone was suddenly much darker.

A Muggle woman, with two small blonde haired children in tow, glanced over worriedly. George waved at her smiling merrily. She looked away, evidently pacified, Lee felt something die inside of him – his last hope was gone. No one could save him now. He wondered if he could Apparate away before the twins could inflict any sort of pain on him. Judging by their grim expressions and clenched fists, he concluded that his chances of escape were less than zero.

"Urm…yes. But not by choice." Lee said hurriedly.

"You mean that our baby sister is not good enough for you?" George said solemnly, raising an eyebrow.

"No. No. That's not what I meant."

"Well, that's what it sounded like."

"You're right there, Fred." George growled.

"But, you know I have no choice, I wouldn't date your sister otherwise, never, I mean, we're friends. Friends don't date their friends' siblings." Lee quoted.

"Correct. I thought that that was made very clear when we first became friends." The twin on his left – Lee thought it was Fred spoke.

"But, the stupid Law means that I have to marry your sister."

"But," George said, "You did not have to take her on a date. That was not in the contract."

"I can't marry her without really knowing her, I've never even really had a proper conversation with her." Lee protested weakly.

The twins exchanged dark looks. "Oh, we think that dating is unnessecary in this instance." They spoke in terrifying unison.

"Oh, c'mon you two have been out with Luna and Angelina, haven't you?"

"Are Luna and Angelina your sisters?"

"No." Lee admitted sulkily.

"Well, then I don't think that this is a relevant point."

"If Gin wasn't your sister you wouldn't have a problem with it?" Lee tried.

"Don't call her Gin." Fred snapped.

"Why? I've always called her Gin."

"That was before you were her fiancée. Times change." George explained airily, waving a hand extravagantly in the air.

"She doesn't care. Does she even know you're here? I bet she'd be mad if she knew."

"She's seventeen." Fred said with a slightly patronising smile, completely ignoring the end of Lee's sentence. "She doesn't know what she cares about yet."

"She's legal. We don't have any choice, you know we don't."

"We haven't got onto her legal status yet." George frowned, "That's a whole new subject."

"I didn't know that we even had subjects." Lee said, "I thought it was just all about Ginny and how I have been forced to compromise our friendship."

"Don't be sarky with us." Fred tutted loudly and shook his head in mock despair.

"Two of us, one of you." George smirked, patting his pocket menacingly. Lee could just see the tip of his wand.

"Crowded public place, heaps of Muggles." Lee grinned back. "Exactly why I chose the place."

"Back to the point! Why did you take our baby sister on a date yesterday at 4:17pm until 5:36pm?"

"How d'you know the times?" Lee asked, slightly incredulous.

"Oh, we have our ways. So, why, Lee?"

"It was a coffee, that's not a date. And, it was just an hour." Lee attempted.

"If you are together, with no-one else there and you do something together – in this case, for example, you had a coffee – then it counts as a date. And it was over an hour."

"You two spend a lot of time together, creating pranks and jokes – therefore you two must be dating." Lee laughed.

George sent him a dark glower, Lee immediately stopped laughing, "Shut up. Why did you take her on a date?"

"We'd just come out of that stupid Ministry meeting, signed the contract and stuff. She was dead upset and I didn't want to just abandon her, I mean, I am her fiancée now. It wouldn't be right to just abandon her in the middle of Diagon Alley, she wasn't in the right state to Apparate." Fred and George winced at the 'f' word. Lee stifled a smirk. "Well, I thought we could go for a coffee, she'd calm down a bit and then she could Apparate home safely, and anyway, when we're married we're gonna have to do a whole lot more than have coffee, I want to get to know her and stuff."

"No." Fred said, covering his ears, "Do not talk about what you're planning with our baby sister in front of us."

"Especially," George said, cringing visibly, "As we are not even on that subject yet."

"Okay, have we finished this subject now?" Lee asked reasonably.

"Almost." Fred folded his arms and sent a glower at Lee.

"We just want to say that we are allowing you to take Ginny on two more dates before your marriage, that's it. And no funny business because we will know."

They nodded together. Lee nodded as well, feeling mildly scared.

"Good, we understand each other. Now, subject two." Lee thought George was speaking – he did seem to have an obsession with the subjects.

"No kids." Fred said.

"At all." George continued.

"It's in the contract?"

"Yeah, our baby sister is seventeen. She's barely legal, she is not old enough to be married or have kids. Or do anything that, you know, leads to reproducing."

"She wants to finish her education. No kids until she's twenty."

"At least. And I'm godfather of all children." George added.

Fred glared at George. George looked guilty. "I thought we decided not to talk about the godparent stuff until we'd finished threatening."

"Oops. Anyway, back to the point, no kids until she is twenty."

"You do realise that the contract means we're gonna have to meet up twice a week, you do realise what we're gonna have to do in that time."

The twins winced dramatically, Lee grinned happily, he sensed a way out – the uncomfortable talk was suddenly on his terms.

"No!" Fred half yelled. "Don't talk about it."

"Talk about what? Me doing Ginny?"

George growled. "Don't."

"I bet she'd be good." Lee decided that resorting to crudeness and being overly lewd might resolve the conversation sooner. "We could send you a video. And have chats about it, you know, like we did in the old days."

"Absolutely-"

"Not-" The twins faces were frozen in identical expressions of horror.

Lee grinned inwardly, they were unconsciously finishing each others' sentences – they were about to break. "But, you were all for talking about it when it was Angelina and Alicia and Katie we were talking about."

"That was all in the past. Anyway, none of those share parents with any of us."

"Shame. I'll miss those bonding chats." Lee grinned.

"Look, we almost have to go." Fred consulted his wrist. Lee frowned, Fred wasn't wearing a watch. "All we wanted to say was look after our baby sister-"

"Only two dates before your wedding."

"And, no funny business on these dates."

"Oh yeah and,"

"We'll be watching." They continued together before Apparating quickly.

Lee bellowed with laughter, ignoring the startled expressions of nearby Muggles and lay back in the grass again, smiling to himself.


	8. George and Luna 1

**A/N: As requested by Lexxxx and Whisperheart, a Luna and George chapter. Please read and review and I need another request before I can write a new chapter! Please let me know who you want to see - I don't mind if it's a new couple I haven't done yet or an old one I've written a chapter on, please just request!**

**Disclaimer: Bla, bla, bla, I don't own Harry Potter. Yet. Cue evil grin.**

**_Chapter Eight_**

George x Luna  
The Burrow

"Thank you, Mrs Weasley. It was very nice. You are a very good cook, much better than Daddy." Luna beamed at Molly over the remnants of the evening meal.

The whole Weasley clan was in attendance, complete with all of the honorary members – Harry, Hermione and Neville and a few of the fiancées. The room was lit with a peculiar mixture of electrical lighting (to the sheer delight of Mr Weasley who had always wanted electric lights and had been thrilled when Harry and Hermione had helped him install it) and flickering candlelight (as preferred by Mrs Weasley who found the electrical lighting rather comical and still relied on her trust candles). Dishes of half eaten food and empty plates littered the full table. A pleasant hum of chatter rung through the small room.

"You're welcome, dear." Mrs Weasley smiled, happy that she had found yet another motherless child to smother with love, affection and food. "Now please call me Molly." She looked around the room happily, this was how life was supposed to be. She had always wanted a large family, she had achieved this and managed to even add a few in along the way. Bliss.

"Why don't you take Luna for an evening walk, George?" Fred grinned evilly and elbowed his despairing twin in the ribs. Angelina, sitting next to him, snickered loudly.

"Yes, that would be lovely, wouldn't it?" Molly smiled happily, giving George a pointed look.

George groaned and sunk down even lower in his chair begging the ground to open up and swallow him right there and then. Unfortunately, it didn't.

Molly rose from her chair, pushed him out of his own chair and towards the door, Luna following, still smiling serenely.

George paused only to send a death glare at his snickering twin and Angelina who was still in fits of giggles before sullenly following Luna out.

"C'mon then." George muttered, "this way. Let's walk up the hill."

The pair walked out of the small bedraggled back garden accompanied by the malevolent whispers of gnomes hidden amongst the shrubbery and into the expansive fields behind The Burrow. A huge hill rose out of the darkness, looming in the horizon.

There was a long uncomfortable silence which only George seemed to find awkward and Luna finally broke. "I like your house. It's like a proper family home. I've never had that before."

"Why?"

"Well, Daddy doesn't really like big gatherings and he never really encouraged socialising and when I was at Hogwarts I never really had friends until the last few years. I've never had a proper family really."

"What about your mum?" George asked, interested despite himself.

"Oh, she died when I was very young. She had a magical accident, it was all very sad."

"I'm…I'm sorry." George couldn't even imagine his own mother dying, she was the matriarch, centre of the family, the glue that held them all together. Without Molly, Weasley life would be very different, very wrong, very sad.

"Oh no, it's okay. I've got Daddy and I have some friends now." Luna explained happily. "I think life is much better now. And, I think if I was allowed to come here sometimes I should feel like I had a proper family as well."

"Oh, yeah, yeah you should come again. You're gonna be one of the family one day." George said torn between hoping that she would never visit and that he wouldn't have to marry her and feeling a wave of pity that she had never had a big, proper family like his.

He couldn't imagine being without the noisy, infuriating, wonderful family he had, he wondered how she had dealt with the loneliness and quiet.

"You should definitely come again. We have family meals every day, Mum absolutely loves to feed people. You can probably tell by the amount of food she made...there's always some people here, actual Weasleys, honourary Weasleys, old friends. Come whenever you like." He said more forcefully, everyone deserved a family especially Luna. She had seen more than most people during the war. She needed a family like his.

"That would be nice." She smiled. George found himself looking at her smile and noticing how nice it was.

He caught himself, stifled a groan and told his mental voice to shut the hell up. Merlin, what would Fred say if he ever found out about that little errant thought? He shuddered just thinking about the ribbing his twin would dish out.

"C'mon, there's a cave up here. Me and Fred found it a few years ago, it's like a secret hiding place." He grabbed Luna's small hand and pulled her up the rocky hilltop.

About halfway up there was a stony outcrop, George stepped expertly through the rocks, still towing Luna behind him, until the pair stood in a small, sheltered cave.

The floor was sandy despite not being anywhere near the coast, a couple of handy boulders studded the ground and provided uncomfortable seating, the air was cool and clean. In the roof was a circular hole through which the starry sky could be seen.

"Wow. This is beautiful." Luna said admiringly, twirling round excitedly on the spot, arms outstretched, blonde hair fanning out around her.

George laughed. Luna grinned at him and chuckled as well.

Oh Merlin, George thought, we're actually bonding!

"Yeah, me and Fred have found a lot of places like this." George explained, perching on a boulder.

Luna sat opposite him. "You and Fred are very close." She commented.

"Well yeah, we're twins."

"Isn't it odd having a twin? How would you ever know who you were as an individual?" Luna asked seriously.

"Well, I don't. Me and Fred don't see ourselves as individuals, we're like two halves of the same person."

"Yet you are individuals. How does Angelina feel knowing that she will never be Fred's other half?"

This made George think - he wondered how Angelina did feel. After all, Fred and Angelina would be the perfect couple, they were very happy together despite Angelina's earlier misgivings. But, Luna was right, Fred would never really see Angelina as his other half, that position would always belong to him, George. And, he realised with a guilty jolt, Luna would never be his other half. Even if he did fall in love with Luna, she would never be the most important person in his life. The two girls had rivals that they had never even considered. "I...I don't know." George admitted lamely, struggling to explain. "I suppose...well, I just don't know."

"It'll be the same for me." Luna said quietly. "I don't mind though, after all, being a twin is always the biggest thing to you and well...I'm fine with that. I know that we don't get on yet and that we're not even friends but...I really do want this to work. If I can't marry for love, then maybe we might end up in love."

George suddenly felt very guilty - he had made fun of Luna behind her back, to her face even, he'd never even considered the fact that she had feelings too, that she may not have wanted to marry him and that actually, she might want to make this work. He turned to face her. "Me too. Me too. If we have to do this then let's do it properly. Why don't we go...for a coffee or something tomorrow?" He looked at his feet and dug his hands deep into his pockets, blushing furiously. He found himself praying desperately that Fred never ever found out that he had been embarassed when asking Luna out on a date and it was because he was scared of being rejected rather than being discovered asking out old Loony.

"That would be nice." Luna smiled pleasantly.

"C'mon, Lovegood, let's get back before Mum freaks out and sends out a search party or something." He rolled his eyes and took Luna's hand again to lead her through the dark.

They reached The Burrow fairly quickly, realising at exactly the same moment that they were still holding hands. Instantly, they both dropped their hands, exchanged glances and looked away, a faint blush painted across both of their faces.


	9. Blaise and Hermione 1

**A/N: As requested by Whisperheart a Blaise x Hermione chapter! Keep the requests coming (:**

**Disclaimer: I don't own HP, J.K. Rowling does.**

**_Chapter Eight_**

Hermione x Blaise  
The Zabini Mansion

"So, Hermione, Blaise tells me that your parents are both Muggles?" Mrs Zabini said delicately, her perfectly lipsticked lips pursing slightly in distaste.

"Yes." Hermione said firmly, making a mental promise to herself that the Zabini's would not make her ashamed of her background. She loved her parents very much, she wasn't embarassed at being a Muggleborn, it had never stopped her doing anything before and it wasn't about to now.

Mrs Zabini looked faintly nauseous for a long moment, then she seemed to recover herself. She pasted a fake smile across her, admittedly, beautiful face and poured tea from a proper, old fashioned teapot into bone china tea cups. Wordlessly, she handed one to Hermione.

Hermione noticed that they were painted with the Zabini family crest (which was carved, engraved, embroidered or painted onto seemingly every available surface) and some words written in a neat italic script which she thought were a sort of family motto. They were written in Latin and she thought probably read something like, "Down with Mudbloods, yes that means you Hermione Granger. You don't fit in here. Haha. Now leave, immediately, before you taint the air with your Muggleborn-ness."

Blaise lounged arrogantly across the only sofa. It was huge, easily large enough to seat five or six people, with ebony wood legs engraved in intricate scrolling patterns; the sofa fabric was some sort of green silk. He looked incredibly bored yet arrogantly so.

The room, the parlour Mrs Zabini had called it, was sumptuous, decorated entirely with luxurious polished woods, clearly expensive and ostentatious furniture and ornaments and acres of rich fabrics mostly in shades of green and slate grey.

Blaise rose from the couch and crossed to a mahogany sideboard. He took out a crystal cut decanter filled with an amber liquid and poured himself a generous measure before returning to the sofa, drink in hand. He took a long draft, sighing faintly with satisfaction.

An awkward silence hung heavy in the air, neither of the Zabinis seemed inclined to break it at all. Hermione found herself wondering if it was always like this or if the hostility and roaring silence was simply caused by her presence.

Hermione was incredibly uncomfortable. Blaise had owled her yesterday saying that his mother wanted to meet her, it was the first time they had spent any time together since the Ministry meeting and Hermione had already decided that she hated her new fiancée. And his mother.

She couldn't believe she was being forced into marrying Blaise Zabini, for Merlin's sake. He was a Pureblood, rich, arrogant, handsome but simply awful. His best friend was Draco Malfoy, convicted Death Eater and the Zabini's, although never openly Voldemort supporters, had survived the war unscathed prompting many to harbour suspicions about where their sympathies lay.

"And, Hermione, what was your surname again?"

"Granger." Hermione squeaked, internally berating herself for being overwhelmed by the surroundings and Blaise's mother.

Mrs Zabini was incredibly beautiful with long dark hair swept into an understated chignon which was dressed up (because obviously understated was not the Zabini way) with a clasp studded liberally with what appeared to be real emeralds. She had dark eyes and obviously expensive clothing which was not quite wizarding robes (too common) or proper Muggle clothing (too...Muggle) but was instead a blend of the two. Her every movement was refined and practiced – the perfect Pureblood wife. "Oh. How lovely." She said, her very expression belying her words. "I shall send an owl off today, get some announcements printed or something."

"Mother wants you to have one of her rings." Zabini interjected suddenly in a drawling tone, pointedly not looking at Hermione.

"Oh. Okay. Erm..thank you." Hermione replied, sipping her tea and praying that she was doing it right.

From Mrs Zabini's expression, she wasn't. She got the distinct impression that Mrs Zabini would rather burn in hot oil or eat her own body weight in Doxy eggs than have her as her daughter in law.

And Blaise, well, he hadn't even so much as looked at her. Not that she cared; she thought he was rude and arrogant. She was already mentally preparing the speech she would deliver to the Marriage Courts when the three months compulsory probation period had been completed and they would finally be able to apply for a divorce.

Three long months. Hermione stifled a groan.

She would need to include something about his unwelcoming relations, she thought, and that he barely looked at her, she'd need to polish that up a bit though. Maybe get a list of dates they had seen each other on, evidence maybe, she wondered whether a Muggle recording device would work in the Zabini mansion. She doubted it.

Dragging herself back to the present, she found Mrs Zabini speaking in her refined and cool tone. "You can choose which one yourself, we'll probably have to have it resized. Your fingers are rather…chunkier than my own, presumably the Muggle blood." Mrs Zabini said, emphasising her point by wrapping her own oddly slender fingers carefully around her own cup. Her nails were blood red and very long.

Hermione ignored the jibe. "Yeah. Thanks. I have to go now though, I'm afraid. Work and stuff."

"You work?" Mrs Zabini barely managed to conceal her shock.

"Yes, for the Ministry." Hermione said shortly, hoping that brief answers would allow her to leave as soon as possible.

"Oh dear, that won't do. A Zabini bride absolutely does not work. Even if the union is somewhat…unwelcome." She smiled falsely.

Hermione had a sudden fantasy of punching Mrs Zabini in her stupid, made up, perfect, sneering face, it was surprisingly welcome. "Well, I'm not a Zabini bride. I will continue to work."

"But dear," Mrs Zabini looked mildly ill at the enforced pet name, Blaise merely smirked from his position on the sofa. "You will soon be a Zabini bride. Right, Blaise dear?" She looked to her son for support.

"Nothing to do with me. I don't care what she does."

"Well, you musn't work darling. Everyone would think that we couldn't support you or something." She laughed falsely as if the idea was in some way humourous.

"But, you aren't supporting me." Hermione said wearily. "And I like working and honestly, I couldn't care less what anyone thinks."

Mrs Zabini looked momentarily stunned as if someone had slapped her hard across the face or suggested that she start giving away her considerable wealth to poor street beggars. "Fine. You can remain in work until the wedding. After the wedding, if you still insist on working, we can find you a line of employment somewhat more suitable to your new status."

Hermione smirked. "New status? So you think that being a Zabini is better than being a war hero? I think my status is pretty good as it is, thank you very much. What did you do in the war – supported Voldemort wasn't it?"

"Unfounded allegations. Never proven, most certainly not true." Mrs Zabini sniffed, pouring herself another cup of tea and spooning in a teaspoon of white sugar.

"Whatever." Hermione said, rising to her feet. "I'm leaving."

She stalked out, pausing only to thank the house elf who brought her her coat. It looked shaken at her words of thanks.

She Apparated angrily to the Ministry still fuming at Mrs Zabini and her Pureblood predujices. Stalking into Harry's office, she slammed her hands down loudly on his desk. He jumped visibly. "What's wrong?"

"Bloody Zabini's! I cannot marry him. You should hear them all 'oh you musn't work' and all about status…they think they're better than me and they hate me because I'm Muggleborn! And Zabini, he's just an…arse! He didn't even look at me the whole time I was there, didn't talk to me or anything, not that I wanted him to, the jerk!" She ended her little rant, her hands shaking at her sides, her breathing heavy.

Harry nodded, "C'mon Hermione, lets go to the Three Broomsticks and down Firewhiskey like there's no tomorrow."

She grinned gratefully, "Good idea, I hope we get photographed as well. Front page of the papers I'm hoping, I'll show that Mrs Zabini what I'm really like." She smirked happily. Harry chuckled grimly, he could just imagine Mrs Zabini's face, when, upon opening the morning's papers, a nice big photo of her future daughter in law drinking Firewhiskey greeted her. He hoped that the reporter also included a lengthy article which acknowledged her new engagement.

-

Back at the Zabini mansion, Mrs Zabini was complaining. "Merlin, what was the Ministry thinking? A Mudblood for Christ sakes. I thought that the money would be enough to secure at least a Pureblood match. Even the Malfoys got a Pureblood girl, look what we ended up with. No manners, no class, Mudblood, what am I going to do with her?"

"The Ministry wants to promote inter magical relations, it looks good if Purebloods marry Muggleborns. They're spinning some rubbish about 'healing wartime rifts'." Zabini explained, looking slightly disgusted. "You know Mother, if I marry her, it will erase any doubts people have about our…sympathies."

Mrs Zabini closed her eyes, exhaled shakily and nodded, regaining her composure. "You're right, Blaise darling. Tomorrow you must owl her, aplogise, be nice, do whatever you have to do to get her over here. I'll go out and you help her pick out a ring. This is the only engagement you're going to get; we're going to do this properly. Respectably. Even if she is a…Muggleborn."

"Whatever." Zabini drained the remnants of his drink in one gulp and set the glass firmly down on a side table, trying to ignore the rising sensation of dread and nausea in the pit of his stomach.


	10. Percy and Cho 1

**A/N: As requested by LunaPadma… a ChoxPercy chapter. It doesn't have very much actual interaction between them but that is a deliberate thing, I don't see them having long chats or dates or anything. At least not yet...**

**Next, I have been shamed into writing a Luna and George chapter because I've just had three requests for one and so, even though I don't really want to write them (please don't kill me, I love them…just not so much together?) I will because I love you all. **

**And reviews. That was absolutely not a hint. Honest.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter. Jo Rowling does. Lucky, isn't she?**

_**Chapter Nine**_

Percy x Cho  
The Ministry

"Parvati!" Cho cried happily, flinging herself across the bustling tea room and into her friend's arms.

"Cho!" Parvati squealed, hugging her friend and then sitting down at their table. Cho took the chair opposite her.

The waitress, who was lurking behind the till wearing a disgruntled and unfriendly expression, looked over, sighed heavily and began trudging towards the giggling pair.

"How are you and Seamus doing? Tell me all!" Cho said, pulling her jacket off and draping it across the back of the chair.

Before Parvati had a chance to even open her mouth, the waitress appeared. "Can I get you anything?" She asked moodily, her facial expression suggesting that 'getting anybody anything' was the very last thing she wanted to do and was akin only to boiling in oil or having all of her fingernails extracted with red hot tongs.

"Coffee and a pumpkin pasty please, I'm starved." The woman slowly wrote down the order and turned to glare at Parvati.

"Tea for one please." Parvati smiled falsely.

The waitress left, moving at an unhurriedly sluggish pace and wearing a resigned expression.

"So, you and Seamus, I heard you got matched!"

"I know! It was like a dream come true, we'd been together for a while and you know, this law just gave us a chance to step it up. Take it to the next level. I honestly don't know if he would ever have got around to proposing otherwise, he's a typical man. I'm going to be Mrs Finnegan!" Parvati gushed, smiling broadly.

"I know! Lucky girl!" Cho reached across the table to grasp her friend's hands in her own. "You're going to be so happy together."

"Who'd you get?"

"Percy Weasley." Cho replied glumly, her face dropping. She pulled her hands back into her lap.

"Oh. Well, he's not so bad. He's smart and…he's very high up in the Ministry. Good job and all." Parvati attempted to hide her absolute dismay at her friend's bad luck under a barrage of speech.

"Nice try." Cho looked fairly close to tears. "He's _so _boring; we have nothing to talk about. I mean, obviously he's smart and stuff but there is just nothing there. Nothing between us. Even Harry and I were better together than me and him. He's not even that good looking or anything; he's just…not my type."

"It'll be okay, Cho." Parvati said quietly, patting Cho's arm sympathetically. "Look, this law is awful, we all know that. Lots of people are very very unhappy; a lot of people have been given horrible matches."

Cho burst into loud sobs. The moody waitress appeared from seemingly thin air, dumped the order unceremoniously onto the table top and left.

Parvati tutted loudly and said in a perfectly audible tone, "Awful service in this place."

The waitress, now firmly ensconced back behind her counter, shot her a dirty look and turned her back pointedly on the pair.

Cho cried louder. "I don't- I d-don't… w-want to ma-ary h-him." She hiccoughed through tears.

"I know. It isn't great…look, you don't have to actually talk to him, you know." Parvati tried valiantly to console her friend.

Cho looked up to glare at Parvati. "Yeah, not talk to him…just marry him and have his kids! They're going to be bloody Weasleys! They'll be ginger and freckly! I'm going to be related to the Weasleys! CHO WEASLEY! It's awful, sounds completely wrong. Completely wrong match." She ranted angrily, a witch sitting at a table behind them jumped visibly and spilled tea down herself. The waitress laughed nastily.

Parvati recoiled slightly from her raging friend, appeared to notice her lack of tact and moved back to her original position. "Look, I can't help you." She began softly. "You know, there's nothing we can do about it. So, how about we eat cake and bitch about Percy and be horrible about some new couples until you feel better?"

Cho nodded fervently. Parvati handed her a tissue and she blew her nose noisily and wiped her face clean. "Did you see the pictures of Harry and Lavender's fight?"

"Merlin, who didn't?" Parvati beamed, taking a sip of her tea. "She did it deliberately; she wanted people to know all about them. She's going to be the wife of the Chosen One, doors are just opened for her. She wants to make a sort of career out of it…she's going to make sure their next date is photographed as well. And, apparently, he's reserved a ring!" She babbled excitedly, delighted to be able to share unknown gossip.

"He looked pretty mad in the photos, are you sure he actually bought a ring?" Cho asked doubtfully, she'd dated Harry, she didn't think that he and Lavender would ever be happy together. She made a mental note to keep that to herself.

Parvati nodded, "It was all over Witch Weekly. He denied it all of course, but, well don't tell anyone but…Lavender was thrilled. You know what she's like, she loves the publicity. And she really is a romantic at heart, for all her rules and stuff."

They exchanged glances at Lavender's new found 'dating rules', she stuck to them religiously ever since her humiliation over the disastrous relationship with Ron Weasley.

"Well, aren't we all though? All we girls love romance and surprises and stuff."

"I know, Seamus wants to take me shopping to actually choose a ring, he reckons I've got better taste at that sort of thing. And, his mother is no good at that sort of thing. She's all Irish." Parvati stifled a shudder. "The ring would probably be Leprechaun gold with an emerald clover on it!"

They burst into girlishly horrified giggles.

"I need to get a ring." Cho mused thoughtfully. "Percy wants me to come to some Weasley dinner thing, apparently they all go… like all the Weasleys and Harry and Hermione and I think Neville. You know, Longbottom? Apparently, loads of the fiancés go as well so I suppose I should. Lavender might be there so it could be okay."

"Is Percy the ring type though?" Parvati asked seriously.

"I really don't know. I don't know him at all. I hope so! He's got to be earning a fair bit, he's assistant to the Minister of Magic. I bet he earns enough to get by. God, can you imagine if we end up living together?"

"Merlin, I don't envy you that!" Parvati squealed.

"I know. Can you imagine? Everything would be very serious and organised and…bla."

"Bla?" Parvati raised a well groomed eyebrow, trying to hide her amusement.

Cho nodded fervently, grinning widely. "Bla."

"That sums him up doesn't it?"

"Oh yes. I will be Mrs Bla."

Parvati laughed. "That's a good one. At least you've kept your sense of humour!"

Cho consulted her watch and jumped to her feet. "He's on his lunch break, I'm going to go ambush him and ask him about rings."

Parvati nodded, "Good luck!"

Cho left quickly, throwing her share of the bill on the table, pulling her jacket on as she crossed the road, narrowly avoiding a miniscule witch carrying no fewer than thirty precariously balanced cauldrons.

She ducked into the Ministry, reported to the Welcome Witch and received a vivid purple Ministry pass.

"Percy!" She called, striding down the corridor.

Percy Weasley sat at a desk at the end of the corridor, on his desk was a huge stack of papers, several appeared to be smoking. Behind him was a neat wooden door with a small plaque engraved neatly with the words, 'Kingsley Shackebolt. Minister of Magic."

Percy emerged from behind the papers and looked at Cho for a long moment, his face completely blank. Suddenly, something seemed to click into place in his head. "Oh, Cho, it's you."

"Yes. I need to talk to you." She said impatiently.

He shook his head. "I don't really have tim-"

Cho cut across his words. "We're going to get married very soon, you need to make time."

"You know what this is?" He asked, waving an arm at the smoking papers.

Cho shook her head.

"These are today's complaints. They were Howlers but we have a team who explode them so they just come to us as letters. So far today, we have received eighty four letters, every single one needs reading and replying to. I have an awful lot of work to do."

"Okay, well I'll just take five minutes." Cho said in a determined fashion. "I need a ring. And yes, I would like to come to your Weasley dinner. I like silver rings for an engagement, nothing too fancy or disgustingly expensive. If you don't know what to choose or you don't have time then I can pick one out and you can pay." She smiled sweetly.

Percy blinked, nodded and ran a hand sheepishly through his red hair. "Oh Merlin, yes, I forgot all about a ring." Cho resisted the sudden violent urge to throw something at him – stupid man, how could he have forgotten about buying an engagement ring? "You choose one, I'll pay. Mum'll love to see you at dinner, Floo into The Burrow. Anything else?"

Cho seemed slightly disgruntled at his abruptness. "No. That is all." She turned on her heel and flounced out, her long hair swinging behind her.

Percy sat down heavily at his desk wondering what on earth the Minister had been thinking when he reinstated the law.


	11. George and Luna 2

**A/N: So, because I love you all, I have written you something vaguely George and Luna-ish (if you tilt your head to the left, rub your nose and squint), as requested by FaithfulHPReader and Nikki Diamond and natalie211. **

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. J. K. Rowling does. **

**_Chapter Ten_**

The Burrow  
GeorgexLuna

"What are you reading, Forge?" Fred asked cheerfully, punching his twin in the arm.

George groaned inwardly – he'd been found out. "The Quibbler." He muttered sulkily, closing it quickly and shoving it under his duvet.

He watched as various emotions flitted across his twin's face – disbelief, humour, shock, worry, amusement. Finally, Fred burst into raucous laughter. Several minutes passed before Fred had composed himself enough to actually speak.

"You're reading… the Quibbler? Why?"

"Luna asked me too." George said defensively.

"So?" Fred was confused; a sudden horrible idea flew into his mind. He attempted to ignore it. "You don't…like her? Do you?"

"No." George replied quickly, he flushed a vivid red, instantly underminding his words. Fred banged his head against the wall, wincing at the pain.

"Yes." George admitted. "Oh Merlin!"

Fred chuckled delightedly. "Oh ho, little wee Georgie Pie likes the Loony."

"Don't call her that. She's actually not that weird, you know she isn't."

Fred raised an eyebrow. "She interrupted dinner yesterday to ask everyone to check under their seats for some creature, I forget what she said it was."

"Nargles."

"What the hell is a Nargle?"

"I'm not telling you." George folded his arms across his jumper clad chest.

"Why?" Fred crossed his own arms and frowned at his twin.

"Because you'll just use it to take the mick."

Fred began a denial and then realised that actually, George was entirely accurate. "Fine. Don't tell me what a Nargle is."

"I won't." George stuck his tongue out and Fred made a childish face. Then, suddenly they began to laugh.

"Still cannot believe you like her." Fred said in a shocked tone, shaking his head.

"Yeah, well…don't tell anyone."

"Course not. It will absolutely not slip out at dinner tonight."

"Fred!"

Fred just grinned wickedly and left the room, still chortling to himself.

George growled angrily and cursed his infuriating twin. Knowing Fred, and he did know Fred very well, he had managed to somehow record his confession and his utter humiliation would be witnessed by all at dinner tonight.

It wasn't that he was exactly ashamed of Luna, or of liking her. He wasn't. Not really. It was just that…well… he had wanted to talk to Luna about it himself, he'd wanted her to know that he did like her but hear the words from his own mouth. And not yet, certainly not yet. They'd only known each other properly for just over two weeks (he found it slightly worrying that actually he knew the exact number of days since the first family dinner she had attended), although they had been sending letters regularly and she'd come along to heaps more Weasley dinners – it was still far too soon. She'd be freaked out.

He'd never in a million years thought that the person he would grow to like would be Luna Lovegood. It almost made him want to laugh. Luna Lovegood!

And yet, he was intrigued by her odd and unshakeable beliefs in these weird creatures. He liked that she had found it in herself to forgive her father after he betrayed her closest friends, realising that he had done this to try and save her. He thought it was amazing that she had managed to survive in the Malfoy cellar and still be as happy and upbeat as she was.

He actually liked that she was different. He liked how she didn't have many friends but truly cherished the few she did have. He liked her honesty and how she made him laugh (mostly without meaning to though, it did have to be said) and how easily impressed she was by various hidey-holes he and Fred had created.

He just…liked her.

Suddenly, his personal owl (him and Fred had invested in a special 'business owl' for letters that needed delivering relating to their shop) flew through the open window and stuck its leg out.

George crossed the room quickly and took the letter; the owl ruffled its' feathers in an irritated fashion and flew onto its' perch. George threw it a treat and it hooted softly in thanks.

'_George,_

_I hope you're right; it would be awful if Molly didn't like me after yesterday. I really do like your Mum and the rest of your family. They almost feel like my own family now._

_I really did think that there was a Nargle in there, I just wanted to check. Are you sure it wouldn't be better if I didn't come to dinner tonight?_

_And, are you sure that Daddy should come? Only well…you know what happened when Harry and Hermione visited during the war. I would understand if it's easier for him not to come._

_Write back soon._

_Luna. '_

George fervently thanked Merlin that Fred had not been in the room when the letter had arrived. The teasing would have been something horrific.

"Got a letter?"

George turned quickly to see his youngest brother lounging in the doorway, smirking happily like the cat that had gotten the cream.

"Yes. What's it to you?"

"It's from Luna." Ron said, still grinning and seeming to relish having something to hold against his brother. George wished that he had not spent so much time teasing his younger brother, it had led to this horrible situation where Ron would grasp any oppurtunity to laugh at him. At least, at least Fred was not here.

"No, it's not." George denied, hiding it behind his back.

"It's written on bright yellow paper." Ron pointed out in a reasonable tone. "Luna is the only person, possibly in the entire world, that writes on yellow paper. She writes to all of us as well you know, and anyway, you can't keep secrets from us."

"Yeah, Forge." Fred appeared seemingly from thin air to stand beside Ron. George wished that a Manticore would suddenly pop out of thin air and savage him to death, that would be a preferable situation to the one he was in now."How could you?" Fred continued, feigning anger and hurt, his hands planted firmly (and slightly girlishly) on his hips. "I thought we were perfect together."

"Go away!"

"Naa." Ginny peeked into his bedroom. "I don't think so, Georgie." She announced brightly.

George slumped despairingly onto his bed. Most of the time, he really loved his family, all of them despite their faults. Sometimes though, he wanted to curse them all into the next century. At the moment, he was definitely feeling the latter.

"Something wrong, little brother?"

George squeezed his eyes tightly shut and hoped desperately that he had not just heard Bill's voice.

He opened them slowly. He had indeed heard Bill's voice. Bill smiled cockily, "My little brother…in love…" He clasped his hands to his heart and feigned a hideous, love struck expression.

George reached carefully towards his wand – they seemed not to have noticed, engrossed as they were (and by now, he could see that Harry and Hermione were outside his door as well and joining in with the rest of them) in sappy impressions of him and Luna. He flicked it hurriedly and the door slammed shut, he heard a yell – the door appeared to have hit Ron in the nose. He beamed contentedly and sent a quick Locking Charm at the door.

The lock clicked satisfyingly into place - now, he would not be disturbed.

He grabbed a piece of parchment from his desk and a quill (checking it to make sure it was not a real quill and not a prototype from the shop first) and sat down to write back to Luna.

'_Luna,_

_Of course you should come, and bring your Dad as well. Harry and Hermione have already forgiven him. Honest. I'd like to meet him properly, I think Mum wanted to talk to him about wedding plans as well (scary, isn't it?). She's loving this law, she has loads of weddings to organise and a whole load of new people to feed._

_And, I promise that Mum doesn't hate you, she thought it was touching that you wanted to make sure we were all safe. _

_Come over for dinner tonight about seven. See you then._

_George.'_

He re-read it. Twice. Then he turned to his owl, who had fallen asleep and turned its' back moodily on George, he poked it awake and handed it the letter. It flew away, making a clicking sound with its' beak that sounded scarily like Professor McGonagall.


	12. Neville and Hannah 1

**A/N: As requested by Whisperheart and FaithfulHPReader and little-writer61, a lovely shiny Neville and Hannah chapter. It's actually one of the longest chapters in this whole story so far - it was inspired by several recent visits to hospital, Frank and Alice's condition reminds me of dementia and unfortunately, I have rather a lot of experience with the illness. Obviously, it is written in Hannah's POV because I couldn't let myself write Neville's POV because it would end up being my own thoughts.**

**Enjoy! Please review and keep requests coming in – I'm working my way through them and I promise that eventually your request will be written!**

**Disclaimer: I'm really bored of writing these to be honest – I do not, and never will, own any part of Harry Potter. Everything belongs to Jo Rowling. Still.**

Neville x Hannah  
St. Mungo's

"Well," Augusta began in an oddly ominous tone, "I think that white is all well and good but you do need some sort of colour, dear, all white is too bland for words. White isn't good for the complexion either, you know, washes you out completely. Although, the dress should obviously be white, there must be some other colour somewhere-"

"Gran, it's Hannah's decision." Neville inserted quietly the minute Augusta paused to draw breath. Hannah smiled in gratitude and Augusta glared at her grandson.

"Fine, dear, I was just giving my opinion." She folded her arms self righteously and turned imperiously to Hannah.

"Thanks." Hannah said, "I'd like white and pale blue, I think."

Augusta paused thoughtfully for a minute or two and then rather unexpectedly offered, "In our family, there is a rather beautiful hair comb, traditionally worn by our brides, which has blue stones on, I think they are sapphires but I'm not sure. It is made of silver. You are very welcome to use it."

Hannah nodded happily, "Yes, we could have silver in the colours as well."

"Now, what about the actual ceremony? Your parents are wizards, aren't they, dear?" Augusta continued without waiting for an answer or actually drawing breath. "So, presumably you will be having a wizarding marriage service. We are friendly with a very good minister, whole family have used him, he would probably do the service for you."

"My mother was a witch, but my father is a Muggle. He'd like to see a wizard marriage ceremony though." Hannah replied softly, feeling a lump in her throat. She swallowed hard; Neville slipped his hand into hers and squeezed it gently.

She smiled gratefully at him. Augusta appeared not to have noticed anything and was mid spiel, talking about flowers and the reception quite merrily. She appeared to be in her element – bossing people about, making decisions, forcing her opinions on people.

Augusta knew everybody, had a solution for everything and had an utter disregard for any idea that was not her own. Hannah could see that Augusta planned on being very involved in the wedding plans. Not that she minded, she was just glad that her mother wasn't around, her mother would have had some fairly strong opinions about the wedding as well, she could almost imagine the argument they would have had.

Personally, she wasn't that bothered about the actual wedding – it was the marriage she cared about, it was marrying the man she loved, it was being Neville's wife, it was being Mrs Hannah Longbottom.

She smiled inwardly at the name. She'd never intended to fall in love with Neville, if you'd told her when she was younger that she'd end up marrying Neville Longbottom she would have laughed. For many years, they hadn't even known one another properly, they'd been in some classes together but never had a real conversation. However, when they were both in the DA for the final year, they had grown closer, leaned on one another, comforted each other.

A friendship had formed between them, in the midst of a deadly war whilst they risked serious danger and flirted with death, which developed and changed into the first stirrings of love, and she knew that Neville felt exactly the same.

The Law was a good thing – she wanted to be married to Neville. She thought that eventually they would have been married anyway, this law just pushed them together, gave them a few more years. They would never have to look back and regret not being together sooner. There would be no regrets, she would be his, have his name and he would be hers.

"Gran." Neville interrupted suddenly.

Augusta looked up looking like a startled rabbit, evidently she was not used to be cut off, "What?" She asked indignantly, pursing her thin lips.

"I'd like to take Hannah to see Mum and Dad now. We'll talk about the wedding tomorrow. If that's okay with you?"

He turned enquiringly to Hannah, who nodded. She saw a difference in Neville, the war had changed him. He'd become stronger, fiercer, harder. He could stand up to his Gran, he could fight with the best of them, he was a changed man. This was the man she had fallen for – the man who could protect her, who would look after her no matter what, who would, and could, fight for her.

She was nervous about meeting Neville's parents, in a particularly horrible moment in the Room of Requirement he had told her all about his parents and what had happened to them. He had cried. She had cried. They'd grown closer.

She'd promised that when the war was over, she would go and visit with him. He said that he couldn't go alone, he needed someone with him. She'd nodded, not needing to voice the whispered words in her head, _'Of course I'll go, I'll be there for you. I'll always be there for you. Always. I love you.'_

Of course, she hadn't actually said that. It wasn't the time, they hadn't known each other long enough, she couldn't tell him she loved him. But he knew, of course he had known, he knew her better than she thought she knew herself. He'd known what she had wanted to say and had been comforted and elated by her silent non words.

Neville pulled her gently from the sofa, waved goodbye to Augusta (who had begun making notes of what she had wanted to say, frowning as she did so) and led her out of the door. Hannah bid Augusta farewell, Augusta raised her head, waved airily and turned away again.

Outside, Neville Apparated away quickly, Hannah gripping his arm tightly. She could Apparate, she just didn't like to. Side-Along Apparation took some of the pressure off, she still hated the squeezing, disorientating sensation but found it easier this way.

Neville knew that of course. She'd never told him, he just knew.

They entered St. Mungo's in silence – Hannah not knowing what to say and Neville not wanting to say anything. His jaw was set rigidly, determination in his eyes masking the hurt that she knew was deep inside.

He knew his way around the hospital well, she wanted to comfort him for even having to know where to go. "This way." He said at last, tugging her through a plain unmarked door.

The room was quiet, deadly quiet. His parents were the only inhabitants, Augusta had requested a private room for her daughter and son-in-law. The hospital staff had had no choice but to agree (prompted as her request was by a rather large sum of money).

Neville took a deep breath and reached for the handle, he turned it and stepped inside, closing it behind them.

Hannah turned to look around. Two beds – each home to a frightened inhabitant. She couldn't believe that these were his parents, they looked older than Augusta. Alice's face was aged, ravaged but not by time – by magic. She wore a striped nightgown and a befuddled expression.

She looked at Hannah, terror in her eyes. She looked at Neville, her expression unchanged although something that may have been recognition flickered and then died.

"It's okay, Mum." Neville crooned softly. "This is Hannah, she's my fiancée. Want to say hello?"

Alice's face didn't change; she didn't even seem to register Neville's words.

"Go on, say hello." Neville whispered to Hannah.

"Hello, Mrs Longbottom." Hannah said gently, smiling at Alice.

Alice pursed her lips slightly and frowned with concentration as if trying to remember something. Then, her expression blanked and she turned away, staring at the ceiling as if something fascinating were happening on it.

Hannah turned her gaze to Frank. He looked equally as old as his wife, although he didn't seem to know who Alice was; there was some sort of bond there between the pair. Frank was looking helplessly at Alice as if she would shield him from these strangers.

"Dad." Neville said.

Frank looked at him.

He looked at Hannah.

He looked at Alice.

He opened his mouth as if to speak, moved it soundlessly for a few seconds and then closed it.

"Hello, Mr Longbottom. I'm Hannah."

Neville's grip on her hand tightened, she could see tears glimmering in his eyes. She continued talking to his parents, giving him a moment to compose himself, he wouldn't want to cry here. Not here, not in front of his poor parents.

"I'm going to marry your son. I'm really happy about it." She smiled at Neville quickly. "You know Neville. He's your son. He loves you both very much. He misses you, I think. I think you would have been very good parents. I'm glad I met you."

Frank stared at her, wordlessly, his eyes dead. There was no spark, no life, no movement in his dark eyes.

It frightened her; she gripped Neville's hand who squeezed it back. "Shall we go?" He whispered.

Hannah nodded.

Neville reached over and touched his mother's hand lightly, she looked at him inquisitively. "Goodbye, Mum." She frowned and then dug under her pillow, she rummaged for a while, Hannah wondered what on earth was under there. Eventually Alice pulled out a crumpled gum wrapper. She held it out timidly to Neville, who smiled faintly and took it slowly, making no hurried movements so as to not startle her. "Thanks. Love you."

He turned to Frank and gripped his shoulder. "Bye, Dad. Take care, love you."

Frank half smiled and waved at the air next to Neville, apparently at some sort of invisible person standing there.

"Goodbye, Mr and Mrs Longbottom. It was nice to meet you." Hannah said politely.

The pair stumbled out of the hospital, Neville walking faster and faster through the corridors, his chest heaving as if he couldn't suck in enough oxygen.

Once outside the hospital, ignoring the inquisitive glances they were receiving he Apparated almost instantly to his flat. Hannah pulled helplessly alongside him. It was in Muggle London, he hadn't wanted one in a magical community, he preferred anonymity.

He fumbled with the key for a long minute before Hannah gently took it from his shaking hands and unlocked the door. He staggered inside and collapsed onto the small sofa, Hannah sat down beside him.

She wrapped her arms around him and held him as he wept, realising that he needed to cry, he needed to express his grief. And, well actually, he needed her.


	13. Draco and Katie 2

**A/N: As requested by LunaPadma and Whisperheart, Katie and Draco. Not quite how I'd planned it, but I couldn't come up with anything better. **

**Please keep reviewing. Also, a massive thank you to everybody who has already reviewed - you're lovely. Honestly (:**

**Disclaimer: Harry Potter - it ain't mine. No siree.**

DracoxKatie  
The Malfoy Mansion

'_Katie, darling,_

_My mother is dying to meet you, she wants you to come for dinner and then discuss wedding plans with her, so I'll pick you up about seven from your flat. Don't bother saying no or making up an excuse I'm coming anyway._

_Wear something nice – Malfoy dinners are always formal._

_Draco.'_

Katie screamed in frustration, threw the letter across the room and buried her head deep into her pillow. Alicia, sat on the bed opposite her, sent a concerned look at the back of her friend's head and then looked at the letter, wondering how mad Katie would be if she read it.

"Everything okay?" She said lightly.

Katie lifted her head slowly, and a tad menacingly, from the pillow and glared. "Bloody Draco Malfoy! I will not meet his parents! They're Death Eaters! They're Dark Mark-ed! Death Eaters!" She finished her slightly hysterical rant and slumped back into her pillow.

"Right." Alicia muttered. "Dark Mark-ed isn't a word. What's wrong with Malfoy?" She said, adding in her head _'What is right with Malfoy?'_

Katie threw the pillow at Alicia, who dodged it quickly and grinned cockily, the old Chaser reflexes were as good as ever.

Katie growled, "It's Draco bloody Malfoy! He has the Dark Mark! He has the Dark Mark!"

"You already said that." Alicia pointed out in a reasonable tone.

"I know! It's because he has the Dark Mark!"

"Yes, but aside from the fact that You-Know-Who actually lived in his house and that he hates all half-bloods and Muggles and Muggleborns and he's a year or two younger than you and he's an arrogant idiot, what's wrong?"

Katie raised an eyebrow. "You just said it all."

"Yeah." Alicia admitted. "But, at least he's rich. And the mansion thingy is so big that you probably won't even have to see him."

"Yeah, apart from when we have 'intimate relations'." Katie shuddered visibly and her whole face paled dramatically.

Alicia burst into fits of giggles. "Unlucky!" She managed to choke out through the laughter.

Katie glowered at her best friend until the giggling subsided entirely. "You have to do it with Oliver."

Alicia looked nauseated. Katie smiled with satisfaction.

"Yeah, but Oliver is better than Draco."

"Oh shut up!"

"So, what are you wearing to meet the lovely Mrs Malfoy? How about a Voldemort face mask?" Alicia teased.

Katie cackled evilly. "Yes. And black robes. And a stick on Dark Mark. I bet Fred and George sell all that stuff..."

Alicia looked serious, "No, Kate, you can't really. She's going to be your mother-in-law."

"Don't ruin my dreams. In my mind, I'm sweeping in dressed as Voldemort, I can just imagine her silly Pureblood face..." Katie grinned.

-

Draco lounged across a leather chair in the study of his home, a roaring fire blazing in the grate behind him. His best friend was sat opposite and was currently bemoaning his Mudblood fiancée.

"Christ, you should have seen the Mudblood. She looked awful." Blaise complained loudly.

Draco nodded sympathetically, "At least Bell is Pureblood. And I reckon she scrubs up pretty good."

"Merlin, I have to marry the Mudblood!" Blaise said. He'd been repeating this fact over and over ever since his arrival, as if somehow by saying it often enough Granger would disappear or spontaneously combust or something.

"Yep. Katie's coming over tonight for dinner." Draco said, not really listening to Blaise anymore.

Blaise looked at him in confusion. "I thought you said that she wouldn't go on a date with you."

"Well, I left her no choice." Draco smirked. "And Mother is dying to meet her. She wants to plan the wedding and obviously I'm having nothing to do with it. I just told her to take the money from my trust fund and do whatever she, and my darling fiancée of course, wants."

"Granger wants to help with the plans, well, basically she wants to plan it all. Mother's gutted. She thought she was going to plan it all herself, though why she would want to plan another wedding is beyond me, she's planned seven already. So, how exactly did you force her into coming here?"

Draco laughed. "I'm Apparating to her flat and evidently she will eventually have to come with me. She shares with some friend. I forget her name."

"So, she's going to be yours then?"

"Oh yes, one way or another Katie Bell will fall for me." Draco said in a determined tone.

A tiny house elf crept timidly into the room, clutching the Daily Prophet and wringing its' little hands with anguish. "Master Zabini, Mrs Zabini wants you to see this."

Blaise snatched the paper, not even sparing a glance for the skulking elf, skim read it furiously and growled softly under his breath. "Looks like the Mudblood has got some spirit. Look!"

He thrust the paper under Draco's nose. The front page consisted mainly of a very large picture of Hermione Granger and Harry Potter drinking shots of what appeared to be Firewhiskey. Draco watched as if shifted into a second picture of Hermione standing on the bar, giggling and waving her arms wildly. She looked very drunk. Harry was laughing.

Inside was a double page article which detailed the night's events, Hermione and Harry's recent engagements and eye witness accounts. It also included a very small picture of Blaise and of Harry's fiancée, the Brown girl.

Draco smirked, "Looks like she's got a wild side. Who would have guessed it … Granger drinking Firewhiskey and dancing on bars?" He chuckled.

Blaise glared, "Merlin, what's Mother going to say? That was last night, after she met Mother. My bloody picture is in there! There I was thinking at the very least she was respectable, you know? But now, well…"

Draco tried to stifle his amusement. "Look, Blaise, no offence but I have to go get Katie in a sec."

Blaise took the rather obvious hint and nodded at his best friend, "I'll be off then, I'm going to talk to the Mudblood about this." He stabbed his finger angrily at the paper and strode out, grabbing his robes from the house elf at the door.

Draco rose from his chair and stretched, somehow managing to even make this movement riddled with arrogance. He summoned his personal house elf to lay out some dress robes and changed into them.

He then left the house, strode down the drive and Apparated just outside the tall iron gates.

She lived in a small block of flats on Diagon Alley, they looked…cheap. He would never deign to live here, but, when they were married, Katie would come to live with him.

He climbed the two flights of stairs, deciding against actually touching the rickety handrail and knocked on her door. Her friend opened the door, he recognised her from Hogwarts. He thought she might have been on the Gryffindor Quidditch team or something. "Is Katie in?" He asked smoothly.

"Yep. One sec." Her friend disappeared around the corner. Draco took the opportunity to have a look about. The main room was a living room, dining room and kitchen all in one. It was rather messy and cluttered. A door on the left, which was slightly ajar, led to a bathroom (which was even more cluttered than the living area – Draco made a mental note to ensure that Katie had a room with her own bathroom, he would not have all of that girly stuff in his bathroom) and a door to the right seemed to be the bedroom, which apparently they shared. Damn, no room for him in there…

Katie appeared from the door, wearing fairly decent black silk dress robes and a disgruntled expression. "Oh, you're here." She said sulkily.

"Of course darling," Draco grinned as she made a face at the pet name. He did love winding her up. She looked good in the robes - a little bit of expensive tailoring and some colour would improve her. He decided that actually, she would be able to attend Ministry functions with him and not completely embarass him. "I said I'd come, didn't I? I presume you got my letter."

She winced and said goodbye to her friend, a tad of despair in her tone, he thought. It made him want to smirk.

"Come on then, let's Apparate." He said brightly, offering his arm.

She merely looked at it as if it were a poisonous snake or a rampaging Hippogriff. Her nose wrinkled adorably at the end.

"You have to hold my arm, darling. Firstly, you don't know where the mansion is so you can't Apparate yourself and secondly, in public and when their husbands are present Malfoy women always Side-Along Apparate…it's an old custom."

She laid a delicate hand on his arm with obvious revulsion, barely touching him and he Apparated away.

He watched her carefully as they arrived; he wanted to see her expression as she saw his house. The general reaction was shock, admiration and awe.

She appeared entirely unaffected aside from a slight pursing of her lips, "So, did Voldemort leave a little memento when he lived here? You know, a dead Muggle born on the wall or something. Or his signature across the coffee table?"

"Of course not, pet." Draco laughed it off, she was trying to rile him – it wasn't going to work, he'd shrugged off the Death Eater insults a long time ago. "Let's go inside."

She suddenly appeared to notice that she was still holding his arm, she dropped it very quickly as if it were a burning poker. He smirked.

"So, tell me, does your mother have the Dark Mark? Or is that just your Death Eater father?" She smiled sweetly and incredibly falsely.

"Malfoy women don't join another man's service." Draco stated firmly. "Mother never joined the Dark Lord's service."

Katie raised an eyebrow. "That's… medieval."

"Yes." Draco grinned, "All of our customs date from then. Being a Malfoy bride is filled with restrictions. I'm sure Mother will tell you all about them. Now, come on." He swept down the path majestically; she followed almost running to keep up.

Several things she was sure about - firstly, she loathed the Malfoy mansion, it was imposing and menacing and dark. She dreaded having to actually live there. Secondly, she didn't want to be a Malfoy bride, especially if it meant that she had absolutely no independence (and quite clearly, thinking for one's self was not something the Malfoys encouraged in their women). And thirdly, she would quite like to curse Malfoy until he couldn't walk straight for a week.

And, with visions of Malfoy being hit repeatedly with the Jelly-Legs Jinx playing in her mind, she walked happily into the Malfoy mansion.


	14. Fred and Angelina 1

**A/N: As requested by Whisperheart and LunaPadma and NikkiDiamond here is a Fred and Angelina chapter. It's written in Angelina's POV because I'm sure someone wanted me to write it in hers.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own the Harry Potter series, although I have put it on my Christmas list for several years. Sadly, I have never got the rights to the book in my stocking. Funny, isn't it?**

FredxAngelina  
The Burrow

Angelina tumbled ungracefully out of the fireplace, coughing slightly from the smoke. Fred, who was lounged across the threadbare sofa, laughed loudly. She glared at him and he rose languidly and stuck out a hand to help her up, still smirking.

"Eager to see me, Johnson?"

"No." She denied flatly, brushing soot from her clothes and smoothing her hair.

George entered the room, "Ange!"

"Hey George." Angelina smiled and then resisted the urge to laugh as Luna trailed in dreamily behind him. She had a slight feeling that George and Luna were beginning to fall for one another.

"Alright, Angie?"

"Yeah, yeah. Where's your mum? Shouldn't you," she turned to glare accusingly at Fred, "be introducing me to her."

"Oh, right, yeah." Fred replied absent mindedly, his attention focused solely on the kitchen from where strains of conversation could be heard. She noticed that George also appeared to be watching the kitchen doorway. It was suspicious to say the least. She'd known the twins for a long time now and knew that within the next few minutes evidence of their latest mischief would be revealed.

Suddenly, there was a loud bang, a male voice yelled with suprise and what sounded like twelve thousand people bellowed with laughter.

Angelina shot a startled glance at the kitchen, the laughter was very loud. She wondered exactly how many people were here.

Fred smirked at George who high fived his twin. "Reckon we can risk going in to have a look?"

"Naa, Mum'll be really mad at the moment. Better give it a few minutes." Fred advised. George nodded solemnly.

"What did you do?" Angelina asked, attempting to show no sign of her amusement in her tone.

"Nothing." Fred and George chorused in almost practiced unison. They were both wearing identical innocent expressions. Too innocent, Angelina thought instantly, mentally storing away an image of the expression for future reference. Being married to Fred Weasley was going to be detrimental to her health.

"No, seriously you have to tell me… because, if you've put a hex or a charm or something I need to know right now. I don't want to turn into a canary or explode or turn purple or whatever. This is the first time I meet your family…I refuse to be a test subject tonight. Or ever." She added quickly, anticipating the twins using the words against her in the future.

"Turning purple…now that's an idea." George mused thoughtfully, completely ignoring her other words, turning to his twin and communicating through some magical unspoken twin bond.

Angelina wondered idly if they did that often. If she ended up living with Fred (and therefore, George as well) the unspoken twin bond and lack of verbal conversation was going to drive her mad. As was living with Loony Lovegood, although she was fairly nice and unobtrusive, and the two owners of a magical joke shop, she decided to research thoroughly a number of defensive wards as a precaution.

"Yeah, you're right…on the cloaks, purple. I think so." Fred agreed. "Come on, Johnson. Let's go find Mum."

Angelina nodded, trying to ignore the rising, fluttery nerves building in her stomach. Fred took her hand casually and she felt a strange sensation which she very quickly pushed away.

"Mum!" Fred called cheerily, striding into the kitchen.

Angelina recognised several people – Molly and Arthur Weasley, Ron, who looked rather disgruntled and had oddly messy hair as if he'd been out in a gale or something, Percy, a bored looking Cho Chang who also appeared to be studiously ignoring Percy (who, coincidentally appeared not to have even noticed), Harry, Hermione, Neville Longbottom and blissfully content looking Hannah Abbott. Hannah was leaning against Neville's chest and his arms were wrapped tightly around her.

"Fred, I just had a funny incident earlier." Ron said in a would be casual voice.

"Really?" Fred's tone was entirely innocent.

"Yeah, I was just drinking this punch." He indicated a half full glass which was on the kitchen counter, "And all of a sudden there was a loud bang and I was suspended upside down in mid air. Then, there was a massive gust of wind, yes, wind…inside the house which oddly enough, only I seemed to feel. And I was back on my feet."

"Merlin, how awful for you." Fred said sincerely.

"Don't suppose you know how that happened, do you?"

"No, have you asked George?"

Angelina noted that Fred was a bloody fantastic liar, she couldn't even tell he was lying - she just knew that he'd done it. She filed that small piece of knowledge away for a later date.

Ron pulled a face and turned away, evidently deciding that Fred would never admit to the prank and that he couldn't be bothered to pursue it. He tipped the rest of his punch down the sink pointedly.

"We didn't spike his punch." Fred muttered very close to her ear. She could feel his cheek against hers, lifted in a mischievous grin.

"What have you done?" She murmured back biting her lip to keep from laughing out loud.

"You'll see." He grinned cheekily. He tugged her over to Molly Weasley, who was supervising several knives – one was peeling a giant mound of potatoes, another chopped what looked like an entire cow into chunks and one diced a hundred odd carrots. She wore a serenely happy expression.

"Mum, this is Angelina Johnson, she's my fiancée."

"Lovely to meet you, dear." Molly replied, smiling at her warmly. "If you'll excuse me, I just need to get this dinner ready…We'll chat later."

Angelina nodded, "Okay. Nice to meet you too."

Fred leaned back against the kitchen counter and she stood next to him. She noticed that he hadn't let go of her hand once. It made her want to jump up and down and grin until her cheeks went numb.

"You alright, Johnson?"

"Yeah. I'm fine. You have a massive family." She said honestly, looking around at them all.

He did have an awfully large family; she wondered how she was ever going to remember them all. Maybe she could have a giant list with pictures…

"Yeah." He grinned, "Wouldn't swap 'em for the world. They drive me mad sometimes, but, you know… I love them, they mean everything to me."

Angelina had known Fred for many years, they'd been friends for several years but she had never heard him speak so seriously and honestly about anything before. She found herself wishing that one day she would be part of his family.

"You really mean that, don't you?"

"Yeah." He blushed slightly with embarrassment.

She smiled at him. "I think it's a good thing, family mean everything. I wish I had a big family like yours."

He looked at her for a long moment then clutched her hand tighter, placing his own arm on the small of her back and turning her to face him. "Soon, Johnson, you will have."

She flushed a faint pink and dropped her gaze. "Good. You know, I don't… mind marrying… you. I think it's all going to be okay."

"Course it is."

She suddenly wanted to lean forward and press her lips against his. She wanted to wrap her arms around him tightly. She wanted him to never ever let go of her. The feelings startled her, they were unexpected and weird and…frightening.

Then, a loud bang sounded and Ron flew up into the air, scowling angrily. Fred pulled away from her, still not dropping her hand, and made a show of looking surprised and very angelic.

Angelina noticed the remnants of a biscuit on the floor. It seemed as if the twins had managed to charm everything Ron ate or drank…it was going to be an interesting evening.


	15. Harry and Lavender 2

**A/N: A HarryxLavender chapter as requested by natalie211, grangergal101 and All The Pretty Horses. It's also the longest chapter of this story so far. Yay.**

**Thank you to all my reviewers. You make me smile. Lots.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own HP.**

Harry x Lavender  
The Burrow

"But, Parvati… he hasn't owl-ed or anything. And Cho said that he was at the Weasleys' for dinner last night and that he didn't even mention me!" Lavender wailed unhappily, hating herself for making a fuss over a mere man but not quite able to restrain her distress.

"Why do you care? You told me that you don't even love him. I mean, why should it matter that you're not speaking? He'll have to marry you anyway." Parvati pointed out sensibly.

"But… it just looks bad. The paparazzi follow me everywhere and there have been all sorts of nasty articles saying how the 'Chosen One may choose another' and things like that. They're saying that Harry has no interest in me!"

"He doesn't though."

Lavender ground her teeth – sometimes she really hated how Parvati rationalised everything now. They'd both changed since leaving Hogwarts and Parvati had…well she'd grown up a bit. She was no longer the girl who had all the time in the world to listen to Lavender and hear about her problems and crushes. They used to spend all their time together gossiping, bitching, giggling.

Now, Parvati was desperately in love with Seamus who in turn was completely devoted to her. Parvati had her whole life planned out – she'd gotten assistant work at Madame Malkins and planned to work her way through the ranks, she was marrying someone she truly loved, they'd have several children. Her life was going to be domestic bliss.

Lavender fought the growing realisation that her marriage and life would not be like this. Her fiancée hated her, his best mate hated her, his whole (adopted) family probably hated her. She wasn't going to work, Harry had enough money to look after her. She would spend all her time at home, looking after the children they would be compelled into having and who would have Ron as their godfather. She would have to spend a lot of time with the extended Weasley clan who probably despised her. Life wasn't going to be perfect at all.

Still, she reassured herself with the fact that Harry was famous. He was a celebrity. And she, Lavender, as his wife would have a share in that fame, she would be a celebrity by association and if she played it right, she would be a celebrity in her own right.

"That's not the point." She said finally in a subdued tone.

"Look, Lav, send Harry an owl and apologise or make amends or whatever. He's a nice guy, he'll write back. Get your friendship back on track. Everything will work out. Now, Seamus wants to take me shopping, so I must dash. See you later." She hugged Lavender quickly and swept from the flat. Lavender heard a muted popping sound from the hallway as Parvati Apparated away just outside her door.

She took a deep breath and reached for her note paper. She thought carefully about what to say, she didn't want to sound desperate or overly apologetic. She didn't really want to apologise for anything, she didn't think that she had over reacted. After all, she honestly didn't want him to divorce her.

Divorce was the ultimate humiliation – her uncle had divorced her aunt several years ago. Before the divorce her aunt had been the perfect hostess, she was well mannered, beautiful, always immaculate and generous. When her uncle left and divorced her, her aunt had gone rapidly downhill. She'd stopped doing her hair nicely, preferring to pull it into unflattering sloppy ponytails. She never wore make-up. She wore ill fitting, loose clothing. Lavender had watched as her aunt had lost her grip on who she was and realised that this was what divorce did to people. She resolved that this would never ever happen to her, she would not allow it.

'_Harry,_

_Haven't spoken in a long time, fancy meeting up some time?_

_Lavender'_

She hated having to propose meeting up – it came across as desperate. She wasn't desperate, really. She sent it with her owl to Harry and settled down to wait for a reply.

Her days, she realised, were filled with very little. She lunched with various friends where they talked endlessly about the same old things. She tidied her small flat. She went shopping and spent much more than she could afford. That was the extent of her activities, she really needed something else to fill her days.

Her owl returned swiftly, evidently Harry had written back quickly.

'_I think you know why we aren't talking – the media is not a part of my life. You obviously want to be a big celebrity and I can't give you that. If you really want to meet up, come to The Burrow for dinner tonight at about 7. Ron will be there though._

_Let me know if you're coming._

_Harry'_

It wasn't the reply she had been expecting. Her ideal reply would have been sweet and courteous and expressed a desire to meet her soon; it would contain an invitation to dinner tonight or at the very least, the following night. Admittedly, he had sort of invited her to dinner. At The Burrow.

The Burrow was the Weasley home. Ron would be there. She didn't want to attend, she wanted to write back stating that she would not ever see Ron again, let alone go to his home. It would be definite and passionate yet cool and collected. Harry would be won over by her reasoned yet assured words and would come to see her point of view. He would sever all ties with Ron (and, ideally the rest of the Weasleys) and never make her spend time with Ron.

She realised that this was a slightly unrealistic goal though. She also realised that she did have to go to the undoubtedly awful dinner. Cho had been the night before, she'd said that the food was like country food and consisted mainly of stews. Apparently, they talked a lot, very loudly and that the twins put charms on the food and that they all found it funny rather than dangerous and childish. Cho had declined to go tonight though, she, Lavender, would have no back-up. There would be no one for her to talk to if Harry chose to ignore her, no friendly face at the dinner table, no one who really liked her.

Merlin, the evening was going to be horrible.

'_Harry,_

_I'll meet you there._

_Lavender'_

It was already half past three. She bathed luxuriantly and perfumed her skin with various lotions and creams. Then, she selected a simple grey silk dress, curled her hair into neat, blonde waves and applied light make up. This dinner was obviously going to be an informal event – Cho had worn jeans and a blouse. Lavender didn't wear jeans. She didn't really 'do' casual. This was going to be a problem.

It seemed though, that married life with Harry would subject her to many such dinners at the Weasley hovel in the company of Ronald Weasley. She wondered idly how many she would be able to get out of, judging by Harry's obvious disliking of spending any time in her company she reckoned that she would never be forced into attending any.

She applied a generous dab of perfume, slipped her dress on, accessorised it with heels and then, satisfied with her appearance, left the flat.

She arrived at the Burrow at five minutes to seven. She surveyed the house from her position behind the garden gate. It was cluttered and run down and very…Weasley-ish, it looked like the slightest gust of wind would cause it to come crashing to the ground.

The door opened and Hermione Granger appeared at the doorway. She was wearing a pair of shorts and a jumper, Lavender felt immediately over dressed. "Hi Lavender." Hermione called with forced merriment.

Lavender faked a smile and walked serenely up the garden path, trying to ignore the rampaging weeds, clucking chicken and large pile of wellington boots attempting to obstruct her. "Hello Hermione."

Hermione ushered her inside and into what appeared to be the living room.

Several people were sprawled across the two sofas and one armchair, chatting pleasantly and piled haphazardly on top of each other. Fred and Angelina were on the armchair, she was sitting on his lap and giggling at some joke he'd just whispered into his ear. George was crammed onto the sofa, alongside Lee (to whom George kept shooting dirty looks, Lee had his back to him and appeared not to notice), Ginny (who was chatting animatedly to Lee, almost sat on his lap and shooting smug looks over his shoulder to George) and Percy who was reading a very long piece of parchment which trailed onto the floor where it pooled around his feet. On the second sofa sat Mr Weasley and Hermione who were having a discussion about wind farms ('Just fascinating, they actually use the wind to get eleck-tristy!' Mr Weasley was enthusing) and Harry and Ron who hadn't even looked up at her entrance.

She stood for a moment at the doorway, wondering where she was supposed to go, whether she was going to have to sit on the sofa with all of those people and how long before she could leave.

Ginny looked up suddenly, saw her standing there and then half smiled, "C'mon, I'll take you to the kitchen. You'll probably like it more in there, seeing as how some," She shot a pointed look at Harry who just shrugged, Ron sniggered, "people are being very rude in here."

Lavender followed Ginny into the kitchen. Mrs Weasley was stirring a huge pot perched precariously atop the small stove top. Lavender saw that its' contents were indeed rather stew-like. Molly looked up and smiled, "Hello dear. You got here okay then?"

"Yes, thank you." Lavender replied. Despite loathing her youngest son, she quite liked Mrs Weasley, they had met after the Final Battle when she was in hospital and the older woman had been helping out.

Luna was sat at the table and Katie Bell sat next to her. Luna was telling Katie what a Nargle was. Katie looked like she would very much like to escape.

Luckily, at that moment Fred, George and Angelina strode in. Fred announced that the three of them needed to talk to Katie and that they were going for a walk.

Fred and Angelina whisked Katie out of her seat and halfway to the back door before Lavender had time to actually register their presence.

Mrs Weasley just nodded and called out, "Be back before dinner otherwise there won't be any left!"

Ginny turned to Lavender, "She's right, you have to get in there quick. D'you mind if I go back in there?" She indicated the living room.

Lavender shook her head and sat down at the table. She couldn't help overhearing Luna and George's conversation.

"We're just going to talk to her about her marriage, she has to marry Malfoy and she's really upset. We're her best friends so we need to be there for her. I'll be back soon. We'll go for a walk after dinner, promise." George was saying, holding both of Luna's hands in his own.

Luna nodded fervently, "That's fine. I'll be fine."

She waved him off happily and grinned at Lavender. "You're marrying Harry."

"Yeah. I'm supposed to anyway." Lavender replied glumly.

"It'll be okay." Luna said, "Harry doesn't stay cross for very long. In fact," She turned to the doorway, "he's coming in now."

Sure enough, Lavender turned in her seat to see Harry standing at the doorway. "Lavender, let's go talk." He said brusquely, she nodded, said goodbye to Luna and followed him.

They walked silently through the living room, no one even looked up as they walked past, seemingly too engrossed in their respective conversations. Harry led her upstairs and into a tiny bedroom.

Posters of a Quidditch team decorated the walls, two unmade beds were crammed into the space and several items of male clothing were strewn over the floor.

"Look," Harry began in a vaguely hostile tone, "I don't choose to be a celebrity. I don't want to be famous. I don't do interviews, I don't give statements and I don't pose for photographs. I like to spend time with my family and friends, without media interference. If we're going to make this work, you need to understand that."

Lavender nodded, deciding that initially agreeing to his terms was the best move. She could always persuade him otherwise later.

He continued, "Now, we're being forced into this marriage but we can make it work, I've seen it happen. There are lots of people who are growing to like their partners. We should be friends first, take it slow, just like we're really dating."

She nodded again, this was a reasonable suggestion. It was what she wanted to do as well, she wanted to have a proper marriage.

"I'm going to open a joint account at Gringotts which you can use for anything for the wedding. Or if you don't have enough money or anything, well…I can support you." He finished awkwardly, shuffling his feet uncomfortably.

Lavender nodded, "Thanks."

"So," He half smiled at her suddenly and she found herself smiling back subconsciously, "How about we start again? Would you like to accompany me to lunch tomorrow?"

She nodded happily. "Sure."

"I'll owl you tomorrow morning. See you then." He turned on his heel and walked away.

She sat down heavily on one of the beds. She was happy that Harry wanted to take her out to lunch, he seemed to be putting the argument behind them and he'd admitted that he wanted things to work between them. This was a start. Now, to get round the whole publicity thing…


	16. Lee and Ginny 2

**A/N: A Ginny and Lee chapter for marym19, grangergal101, Pilks, FaithfulHPReader and natalie211. **

**Please keep the requests coming in, I also noticed that no one can remember some of the couplings so I'll post them here for you: (If you have absolutely no interest in requesting a coupling then just scroll down and skip the rest of this A/N!)**

**- Lee x Ginny**

**- **** Harry x Lavender**

**- Ron x Padma**

**- George x Luna**

**- Fred x Angelina**

**- Draco x Katie**

**- Blaise x Hermione**

**- Percy x Cho**

**- Oliver x Alicia**

**- Dean x Pansy**

**- Seamus x Parvati**

**- Neville x Hannah**

**I'll do a chapter of any of those you request – whatever you want to read, I'll write!**

**Anybody fancy a wedding or two? ;)**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter. Yet.... ;)**

Lee x Ginny  
The Burrow

"Honestly Mum, I've told you before I don't even want a big wedding." Ginny sighed as Molly placed a huge stack of wedding magazines on the table next to her. She looked at them disdainfully; they all had beautiful smiling witches on the covers and a lack of anything worth reading inside.

"Of course you do, dear, all girls do." Molly said fondly, opening the top one and gazing dreamily at the pages of gorgeous dresses before her. She could just see Ginny in a long cream dress, wide skirt, strapless…

"I really don't." Ginny said firmly, wrecking Molly's daydreaming. "Me and Lee have decided that we will just have the ceremony with no fuss, no dress, no cake or anything. Then in a few months when all the fuss has died down, we'd like to have a big party. Everyone is getting married now and there are plenty of weddings for you to plan."

Molly clucked her tongue impatiently, mildly distraught that Ginny just did not understand. "But you're my only daughter. Of course, I will have some input into the other weddings but everyone knows it's the mother of the bride who has all the power."

"B but you have four sons, an adopted son who doesn't have a mother and you know that Hermione and Neville will both ask you to help out with their weddings. That's seven weddings."

Molly admitted defeat, realising that her only daughter had inherited all of her stubbornness and then some extra on top of that. "Fine, you can just have the ceremony and then your party." She set about folding laundry irritably, muttering inaudibly under her breath. Ginny caught the words 'betrayal' and 'only daughter'. She tried not to laugh.

Lee sauntered casually into the kitchen. "Hey Gin. Hello Molly."

"Ginny says that you're not having a wedding." Molly accused, wondering how easy it would be to persuade Lee that a wedding would be a very very good idea.

"No, neither of us are really into big fancy weddings. We thought we'd just wait a while, until all the weddings are over and everybody's hankering for a big party and then… well, give 'em one." Lee explained, pulling out a chair and sitting down casually beside Ginny.

Molly stalked out taking the laundry pile with her and still cursing the pair under her breath. Lee looked enquiringly at Ginny, "What did I do?"

"Mum wants us to have a big wedding. She's been dreaming about it for years and then we just told her we're not having one…she's not best pleased."

"Oh, yeah, right. Surely she has a whole load of other weddings to plan though?"

"No, apparently your daughter's wedding is the big one. The mother of the bride has all of the power, so she says."

Lee laughed, "Probably right there." He paused, "You definitely don't want a wedding, do you?"

"Nope. Never have. I always wanted a marriage, not the actual wedding part. Even if we'd done this traditionally, in our own time, without everyone else having weddings at the same time, I wouldn't have wanted an actual wedding."

Lee nodded, relieved, "Me neither. Too much fuss."

He stretched out and subtly laid his arm over the back of her chair. She looked at him knowingly and then grinned, leaning back in her chair.

Fred or George, Lee still couldn't tell the difference, entered the room and in an instant, the other twin appeared. Evidently, they had informed each other through their magical mental connection that something was very wrong.

"Hey guys." Lee said cheerfully.

Fred and George exchanged startled looks and then nodded once – intervention was required. One of them, Lee thought it was George, forced his way into the non-existent gap between the two chairs and Fred dragged a chair up on Lee's other side.

Lee found his arm was suddenly slung around George instead of Ginny and removed it hastily.

Ginny rolled her eyes at her brothers, "What d'you two want?"

"Do we need a reason to spend some quality time with our darling baby sister and former best friend?" Fred said innocently, throwing in an angelic, wide eyed look for good measure.

"Former best friend?" Ginny asked, slightly confused. She had always been under the impression that Fred and George, after each other obviously, had considered Lee to be their best friend.

"Yes. He compromised our friendship when he became your fiancée." Fred explained lightly.

"It wasn't like he had a choice. It's pretty stupid that you're not friends anymore because of it."

Ginny felt a pang of guilt, the twins were well known for being overly protective of her, but to stop being friends with Lee over her… She felt bad for Lee, although actually he didn't seem that bothered. He hadn't asked to marry her, he didn't have any choice and neither did she.

"We didn't ask for your opinion." George chimed in, patting her condescendingly on the shoulder.

"And when do you ever spend 'quality time' with me?" She continued suspiciously, grabbing George's hand and bending his fingers back savagely, not even sparing a glance at him as she did so. He winced and yanked his hand away. Lee smirked.

"All the time." Fred countered.

"Name one time."

There was a long silence during which the twins exchanged clueless glances, George nursed his injured hand pointedly and Ginny looked smug.

"Well, never, so we thought we'd start now! We love spending time with you. We'd love to hear all about your life and… stuff!" Fred announced happily, finding a way out of the situation.

Ginny raised an eyebrow, "So, if Lee decided to leave, you'd still stay here and talk to me?"

"Of course." George said slowly and unconvincingly. Fred frowned at him in irritation. It was well known in the Weasley family that Fred was the better liar of the pair.

"Go away." Ginny said calmly, deciding that losing her temper was a bad idea. After all, they were just trying to be nice, they cared about her. They just wanted to look out for her. They were absolutely not being over protective, stupid prats.

"Make us." One of them challenged. Ginny narrowed her eyes, they were playing dirty. They seemed fairly confident that she would not be able to get rid of them.

"Just leave or I'll tell Mum that you didn't de-gnome the garden this morning."

"You can't prove it."

"Yes, I can. The garden is still full of gnomes, idiot."

In unison, the twins folded their arms stubbornly and stared insolently at their sister, daring her to do her worst.

Ginny grinned wickedly at Lee. He nodded fractionally. "So, Lee, how many children should we have?"

Lee smiled back sappily at her. "As many as you want baby."

"I think at least three, sweetie. Two boys and a girl."

George shook his head, "No kids." Fred nodded his agreement.

Ginny continued as if they had not spoken, "We have to go shopping and buy lots of things for when we live together. Like a new bed!"

The twins looked faintly nauseous.

"Definitely, a nice big one, hun." Lee grinned lecherously at Ginny who winked back.

Fred's left eye twitched slightly. George looked pale.

"Yes and I'll need to get some new underwear. Just for you, gorgeous." Ginny giggled girlishly.

"No!" Fred yelled, "No. No. No."

"Don't talk about that-"

"In front of us."

Ginny opened her mouth to continue and George's hand slapped across it to muffle her words.

Ginny sunk her teeth into his hand. He yelled out angrily and withdrew it. Lee laughed and George looked accusingly at Fred, "Why am I always the one that gets hurt?"

Fred smirked, "Luck of the draw, my friend. Luck doesn't seem to like you much!"

"Will you leave now?" Ginny demanded, rising to her feet.

Lee saw a dangerous steely glint in her eyes and fervently thanked the heavens that he was not the twins right now.

"No." They said together.

"We should be here."

"To look out for you. And make sure Lee behaves-"

Ginny drew her wand speedily, waved it in the air and the twins suddenly vanished from the room. The door slammed shut with a loud bang.

Ginny smirked, "Tonks taught me that." Lee grinned back at her – despite being the youngest and the only girl, Ginny Weasley was just as tough as all of her brothers and possibly more devious.

The twins' voices could be heard from the other side of the door, they sounded incredulous obviously Ginny had never used that one on them before.

"How did she do that?"

"I don't know! It was so quick!"

"Let us in!"

They hammered on the door frantically.

Ginny smiled and turned to Lee, "Fancy going for a walk? They'll figure out how to get through it pretty soon."

Lee nodded. She slipped her hand into his and pulled him through the back door already chattering away nineteen to the dozen. He watched her talk, noticing how the fading sunlight turned her hair copper coloured, how alive her eyes look and how actually…this marriage wasn't going to be completely awful.


	17. Oliver and Alicia 2

**A/N: An Oliver and Alicia chapter for natalie211, Pilks and Whisperheart. **

**Keep reviewing and requesting – they make me smile and want to write heaps faster for you.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own any part of Harry Potter, it all belongs to Jo Rowling.**

OliverxAlicia  
Muggle Restaurant

Alicia slumped onto the sofa and picked up the latest copy of Witch Weekly. Katie had gone to the Malfoy Mansion for dinner and wasn't expected back for a while. Alicia had the flat to herself, finally.

It wasn't that she didn't like living with Katie – she did, a lot, she wouldn't want to live anywhere else. She just liked a bit of space sometimes and alone time was hard to come by when you lived in a tiny flat with your best mate.

She flicked idly through the gossip articles accompanied with lurid photographs, actually laughing out loud at the photos of straight laced Hermione Granger and Harry Potter, the saviour of the wizarding world, drunkenly dancing on bars. Actually, if she had to marry Blaise Zabini she'd probably turn to drink as well…

As it was, she had to marry Oliver Wood - her old Quidditch captain. He was quite the eligible bachelor now though, he played Quidditch, Keeper for some team that she hadn't quite bothered to remember the name of. Witch Weekly had included him in a list of 'Top 10 Hottest Quidditch Players!' and 'Most Eligible Wizarding Bachelors'. Of course, the latter list had to be scrapped now – no one who could be called eligible was to be unmarried for much longer.

Thinking about it, she knew that Oliver was perfectly nice and fairly good looking. There wasn't anything completely horrible about him…he just wasn't the one she wanted to fall in love with. He was a bit…bland.

They'd been for a brief coffee after the Ministry meeting and he'd owl-ed her a few times since then, usually in the evening after his practice, just to say hello and check how she was. He'd never asked her out on a date again, not even for coffee or to meet his parents. If she'd bothered enough to ask, she knew that he would say he was very busy with his Quidditch.

She didn't care though. Spending time with him wasn't something she relished. So, yeah, she would love to go on dates with him, unexpectedly click and fall deeply and madly in love with Oliver. She loved the idea of a perfect marriage, a loving husband, couple of kids. She also knew that it wasn't going to happen.

She had a secretary job for someone not very important at the Ministry, Law Enforcement Offices. She wasn't very good at it. To be honest, she spent far too much time gossiping with the other secretaries rather than actually doing any work.

Her education was completed. She had finished Hogwarts before the war; she hadn't had the money to go travelling for a year like she'd initially wanted to do. But, by the time she'd saved up enough, You-Know-Who was in power and travelling the world had been the last thing on her mind.

After the war, she hadn't wanted to go anywhere anymore. Suddenly, she had had an overwhelming desire to stay here with her friends and family. She'd rented this tiny flat with Katie, got the tedious job and spent a lot of time with her friends. She'd stayed in touch with everyone from Hogwarts – the twins, Lee, Angelina, Katie obviously, even Oliver.

Now, she was twenty years old and about to be married! Married!

In the wizarding world, it was quite usual to be engaged at twenty, you could have three children at twenty and you wouldn't be given funny looks in the street.

It was an everyday occurrence for people to get married almost straight out of school. Most witches gave up their careers early on (some didn't even bother getting a job) to have kids and then returned to work when their children began Hogwarts if they still needed the money. If their husbands were rich enough, they spent their time shopping, staying at home and doing nothing of any importance.

Her father was a Muggle, although her parents had split soon after her birth she had continued to see him regularly, and he had been shocked to learn how young wizards were married. She'd learned that the wizarding world was quite traditional, quite backward compared to Muggle society.

A sudden tapping on the window made her jump violently, composing herself she realised that it was just an owl. She slid the window open and he hopped in cheerfully.

She took the letter and read it,

'_Alicia,_

_Fancy going for a very late dinner tonight? Just got out of practice now, pick you up about 8:30?_

_Send the owl back with your answer._

_Oliver'_

Alicia pursed her lips – she didn't want to go for dinner with him, late or otherwise. She just wanted to have the stupid marriage, meet up as required and get on with her life.

However, she knew it would be rude to decline, it seemed like maybe he wanted to make a proper go of things. And Katie would be mad if she found out Alicia had turned down dinner, and Katie would find out - she always seemed to know these things.

She scribbled back a hasty response saying that half past eight sounded fine, realised that she had forty minutes to get ready and dashed into the shower. She threw on a black dress that she thought was possibly Katie's and was just about ready by the time Oliver knocked on her door.

She took a deep breath and opened it.

"Hey," Oliver said, awkwardly handing her a single pink rose. He was wearing smart black trousers and a white shirt which was rolled up to his elbows. It was a warm night, too hot for a dinner jacket.

Despite herself, she was touched by the flower. She laid it carefully on a handy side table positioned by the door and smiled at him.

"Hi."

"Shall we…go then?" Oliver offered her his arm; she took it, stepped out of her flat and locked the door with a wave of her wand.

Oliver Apparated the pair of them into the centre of Muggle London, taking her by Side-Along Apparation. "I prefer Muggle restaurants, if you don't mind. Food's better." He said quietly.

She nodded, "That's fine."

He took her into a fairly smart restaurant, one of those places that London is full of. It was divided into two - a smart and sleek bar area, now filled with groups of friends clearly all high fliers wearing designer clothes and flashy watches and sipping elegant cocktails. The dining area in the back area was all dark wood, leather chairs, subtle lighting, the sort of place which considered itself 'modern and elegant'.

The head waiter was surprisingly welcoming; he even smiled as he recommended a wine.

Oliver ordered for both of them, Alicia wanted to complain but unfortunately, Oliver ordered exactly what she would have chosen anyway. She hated the 'wizard orders for both' custom, but at least she had been allowed to actually look at the menu.

On one memorably awful date, the wizard had taken the menu from her and ordered her a salad before proceeding to talk to her about: himself, his job, himself, his previous girlfriend (who apparently had model looks, the perfect figure, an amazing job and was actually an angel in disguise as a human – sadly his words, not Alicia's), himself, his future and himself.

Oliver drew her attention back to the present, "This is okay for you, isn't it?"

"Sure, it's nice." She agreed, "So, how's the Quidditch going?"

She didn't actually care – she just thought that she might be able to people-watch for a few minutes while he talked.

She was right. The Quidditch question was obviously the right one, he grinned happily and launched into a spiel which she might have found interesting had she actually heard of his team.

She looked around subtly. At the table behind Oliver, a bored looking man was listening, well, appearing to listen to, a highly excitable woman. At the bar, two men were drowning their sorrows with large amounts of vodka; they'd removed their suit jackets, rolled their sleeves up, undone several shirt buttons each and loosened their bow ties, leaving them hanging loose around their collars. A large group of women were eating together at a very long table to their left; they were happily bitching to each other and cackling at some story about an unfortunate friend of theirs.

"You're not into this, are you?" Oliver cut in suddenly giving her a disapproving frown.

"Urm…no." She admitted.

"You don't care about Quidditch."

"I do. I just don't want to hear about it all night." She told him honestly.

"Quidditch is the most important thing in my life; I talk about it a lot. As my fiancée, I thought you might have understood that." He said solemnly.

"The most important thing in your life is…Quidditch? Not family or friends? Or…I don't know… something that isn't a sport?" She asked incredulous – she didn't mind playing second fiddle to his mum or to his best friends, but to a sport? She drew the line at that.

Wait, why did she need a line? She didn't care. She didn't especially want him to like her; she didn't care about the marriage.

She knew that she was right in that – she didn't want to be the number one woman in his life, she just wanted to be above a sport. Sadly, she realised that she would never rank above Quidditch in his priorities list.

"Well, yeah. My dad's dead, my best friends are all my team mates and I don't see my mum much. There's nothing else to be the most important. Anyway, I love Quidditch. You know that."

She did know that – he'd been a fantastic Quidditch captain, if slightly over enthusiastic and borderline obsessive at times.

"Yeah, spose."

She changed the subject then and they talked happily - swapping stories of old school friends, laughing at some recent gossip and criticising the Ministry.

When he dropped her home, she sat down on the sofa again. Katie wasn't back yet, evidently still trapped at the Malfoy Manor. She wondered if Katie had hexed Malfoy yet. No doubt she would find out tomorrow.

She thought back over the date. It hadn't been that terrible, it hadn't felt like a proper date though; there were no romantic feelings on either side. It felt a bit like going out for dinner with an old friend…or with her brother.

Merlin, this was going to be one very awkward marriage.


	18. Ron and Padma 2

**A/N: A Ron and Padma chapter for NikkiDiamond, Whisperheart and grangergal101. It's my second update of the day – I'm oddly proud of myself, I'd only meant to write half of this and finish it tomorrow.**

**I actually thought that I'd hate this couple and find them difficult to write but once I came up with the idea I found myself writing and writing until I'd finished it.**

**Keep requesting and reviewing, next I'm doing Dean and Pansy because I have three requests for them.**

**Disclaimer: I still do not own Harry Potter. Happy?**

RonxPadma  
The Burrow

She honestly didn't know why she'd bothered to come. Ron hadn't spoken to her all night, she hadn't really known anyone there, certainly not to talk to, and despite what people said, she found the Weasley clan to be distinctly unwelcoming.

They probably didn't mean to be, they just all knew each other, had a history together. She wasn't part of it; she didn't fit in with them.

She suspected that Ron had actually just invited her because his mother had forced him to, or Hermione had. He obviously hadn't come up with the idea himself. He had sent a letter by owl that morning, well… a note, not a letter; it was scrawled in untidy handwriting on a spare scrap of parchment and measured just four lines.

She'd arrived at the requested time. The house was practically a shack. It looked fairly close to collapse. She'd wondered if it was actually safe to enter.

It was untidy and chaotic inside. Clutter was strewn over every surface – old socks, books – Muggle and magic, shoes, a broomstick, hundreds of photo frames filled with family photos, the odd Ton-Tongue Toffee. Stuff was everywhere. There wasn't much room; they had a lot of people staying there and not enough space for them all.

They'd been piled onto the sofas, chattering away happily – the Weasley family, Angelina Johnson, Luna Lovegood, Hermione and Harry, whom she understood were family in all but name and Neville Longbottom with Hannah Abbott. They all knew each other, they were all chattering and laughing and joking together.

She'd been crammed right onto the end of the sofa; George had sat next to her and turned his back on her to talk to Luna (that was how she knew it was George, not Fred). She'd been completely ignored and very uncomfortable. When Mrs Weasley had called for dinner, everyone had rose instantly and dashed to the garden where they were dining.

Mrs Weasley had arranged a buffet table with enough food to feed most of Hogwarts; however, they all fell upon it like flies. She watched, slightly disgusted, as they loaded stew, chunks of bread, pieces of chicken, salad, mashed potatoes and all manner of other foods onto their plates as if this were their last meal. They dispersed off into smaller groups, pulling up chairs or conjuring them up when there were none left and continuing their stories and chatter and reminisces.

By the time she reached the table and had found a plate (they all seemed to know where they were kept and no one had bothered to tell her), most of the food was gone. She helped herself to a piece of chicken and some salad.

She turned around and gazed around the garden. She didn't know where to sit. No one was even looking at her; she didn't know where she was supposed to go. She was unwelcome here, that much she knew.

A lump rising in her throat, she set her plate back down on the table and went back into the house. She was almost to the door when a voice stopped her.

"Padma?"

She turned around to see Harry. "Oh, it's you." She was a little ashamed at being caught leaving.

"Where are you going?" He seemed genuinely confused, she didn't know why.

Then she realised, this was his home, these were his family. He couldn't understand why anybody would not want to spend time here. Her heart went out to him – he hadn't ever had a real family, the Weasleys' had given him that.

"Home." She muttered awkwardly.

"Oh, but you haven't had dinner yet."

"I don't think I'm very welcome here." She told him honestly.

"Don't be silly, everyone's welcome here. Molly loves anybody that walks through that door."

"Not me."

"Have you even talked to her?"

"No, I didn't even know where she was." Padma was feeling like a naughty school child, it made her cross. Why should Harry make her feel like she was at fault here?

"Look, Ron can be a prat. He's my best mate but he's not good with awkward situations. You being here is awkward for him, he doesn't know you. He doesn't know how to introduce you to his mum because he doesn't know you, he can't tell her anything about you, and anyway, you and him aren't friends, you aren't his girlfriend. You're just his fiancée who he's being forced into marrying." Harry explained, "He doesn't know what to do so he isn't doing anything. None of the others know you and Ron hasn't introduced you so they feel too awkward to talk to you."

She nodded sadly– he was right.

"Want me to introduce you?" Harry offered hesitantly.

She nodded again, "Please."

She followed him out of the hallway and back into the garden, it had grown a little darker and candles floated in random clusters all over the garden. She noticed that the food had disappeared from the buffet table and had been replaced with various delicious looking desserts, they all had servings of puddings on their plates now.

Harry led her over to Mrs Weasley, who was standing alone surveying her family with a proud expression.

"Molly, this is Padma. Ron's fiancée."

Molly smiled happily, "Hello dear. Ron said you were coming. Can't think why he didn't bring you to meet me." She clucked her tongue disapprovingly and sent a glare at her youngest son's back. "Good thing Harry did, isn't it? So, you're a Ravenclaw, right?"

Padma found herself chattering away happily to Molly Weasley, who as Harry had told her did welcome everybody. Harry slipped away at some point, joining Ron and Hermione further down the garden. Molly was pleased, this girl would be good for Ron – she was smart, pleasant and bright.

Molly eventually introduced her to Ginny who was with her fiancé, Lee. She remembered them both from school but had never spoken to either; Molly left her talking to them.

She liked Ginny, she thought if they had been the same age and in the same house at school, they would have been friends. Maybe, they would be friends now. She hoped so. Lee was nice as well, he didn't talk much but what he did say was often funny. She remembered that he had been best friends with the twins.

She couldn't remember when Ginny and Lee had introduced her to Fred and Angelina, but she found herself liking them as well. Before long, they had been joined by George and Luna, who had been on a walk together. Fred teased them about it liberally, George had been embarrassed and Luna completely unfazed by his ribbing.

Later, they had drawn up chairs and convened in a circle, some people were sitting, others stood. Fred had moved some of the candles so they floated in the centre of the group. Mr and Mrs Weasley had gone inside long ago. Hermione had joined them seamlessly and spent a long time talking to Padma.

She'd been lovely, really nice, very different to how she'd expected. She'd heard that Hermione was boring, dull, smug and a know-it-all. She thought that Cho had told her that. Well, Cho had been wrong.

She'd introduced herself quietly, popping up by Padma's shoulder, "Hey…I'm Hermione."

"I'm Padma, nice to meet you."

"Likewise. I'm sorry about Ron. He's naturally rude."

Hermione had laughed and Padma had found herself joining in. "It's okay, I was out of my depth first. I think I'm keeping my head above water now though."

"You are. You fit in here. You'll grow to like them, they're all lovely, honestly. I used to spend my summers here."

They'd talked about career options and their last year at Hogwarts – both of them were returning to re-take the final year, Harry and Ron were as well apparently.

When they'd finally finished talking, she noticed that the circle seemed bigger or perhaps people had just spread out more.

Percy had appeared seemingly from nowhere – Hermione told her that he'd only just arrived from work, she'd introduced the pair and Padma had got on well with Percy.

He was personal assistant to the Minister, a post she had often dreamed of holding. He was bright and intelligent and ambitious but still utterly devoted to his family.

That was something she noticed in everybody present – they were all devoted to the family. That was why they got on so well, they were all part of this big, close knit family, even if they weren't born a Weasley. The Weasleys were evidently good at finding new family members – Harry, Hermione, Luna, Neville… these people had all found a second family with the Weasleys. She wondered if she would ever be part of it, if she would ever blend in seamlessly with the rest of them, would eat as quickly and as much as they did, would spend hours chatting and laughing with them. She sort of hoped so.

Fred and George interrupted their conversation before long and begun telling jokes, despite herself, she found herself laughing at them. She'd heard of the Weasley twins of course, they were well known for being pranksters and they owned the joke shop which every Hogwart's pupil knew the name of, but she'd never thought that she would like them or find them so hilarious.

Angelina was sitting on Fred's lap, she didn't say anything but she smiled once or twice at Padma and laughed along with the twins often.

Harry wandered over at some point and managed to turn the conversation around onto Quidditch. She didn't know anything about Quidditch and didn't speak at all but found herself still enjoying being there.

The Quidditch talk lured the boys like bees to a honey pot. Lee and Neville conjured four chairs out of thin air and sat round with them, Ginny and Hannah took the other two chairs. Hannah and Neville were holding hands, she noticed. They looked very happy together.

Ginny joined in with the talk easily, presumably having six brothers gave you a healthy interest in sports and an ability to hold one's own in any situation. She noticed, with some amusement, that the twins kept glaring at Lee whenever he spoke to Ginny.

She thought it was sort of sweet that they were so protective of her. She wished that she had an older brother to take care of her like that.

She noticed suddenly, that Ron had appeared next to her. He drew up a chair; half smiled at her and then turned to the conversation, blushing faintly.

Everyone was now included in the Quidditch conversation – although many of the girls weren't speaking, she noticed. They were crammed onto chairs, sitting on each other's laps and sharing chairs where they couldn't be bothered to get another one.

She didn't contribute to the discussion even when it split off into several different chats, finding that she was perfectly content to say nothing. Across from her, Hermione smiled at her and then nodded pointedly at Ron who made a face back at Hermione. They laughed silently like little children.

She dropped her gaze quickly as they both turned to look at her, ashamed to have been caught watching them.

"Urm…hey." Ron said suddenly.

"Hi."

"Sorry you had a rubbish time earlier. Harry told me. Made me feel bad actually, he's good at doing that."

"He seems like a nice person."

"He is. He's like a saint, only with funny hair."

She giggled. Ron smiled, clearly pleased at her reaction. "They're all really nice, you have a nice family."

"Yeah. They drive me mad sometimes but I couldn't be without them. Any of them." He looked around at them all, laughing, talking and giggling together. "Erm…fancy coming again tomorrow?"

"Are you all here again tomorrow as well?"

"Yeah. It's like a tradition, we all eat together. Obviously, not everybody comes. Like tonight, Bill, he's my oldest brother and his wife, Fleur haven't come. That's because Fleur is really pregnant and she doesn't like people to see her." He laughed, "And sometimes other people come – Lavender was here the other day, you know her, right?"

"Yeah, she's better friends with my sister though." Padma didn't like Lavender all that much – she was too shallow and vain for her, however, Lavender would have been a friendly face.

"Well she came yesterday and Cho came once, she didn't like it here though. Don't think either of them did." He paused, "You fit in better than they did." He offered unexpectedly.

Padma found herself grinning, "Really?"

"Yeah." Ron flushed a deep red.

"I'd love to come tomorrow." She said hesitantly, she smiled at him.

He nodded and grinned back.


	19. Dean and Pansy 1

**A/N: A very short (sorry! – will put up a nice long chapter asap, promise) Dean and Pansy chapter for natalie211, All The Pretty Horses and FaithfulHPReader.**

**Disclaimer: I'm bored of these now, I still don't own Harry Potter. And, quite frankly, the chances of me ever owning it are non existent.**

Dean x Pansy  
The Ministry

"I can't do it mate, have you seen her?" Dean wailed, throwing himself onto the bed in despair.

Seamus tried to hide his shock – Dean had suddenly appeared in his bedroom and had then laid down on his bed. Instead of jumping out of his skin, accidentally hexing him (as you were perfectly entitled to do to intruders) or screaming like a girl, he nodded in sympathy. "I don't blame you. She is awful."

"She's a Slytherin. A Slytherin! And she's in love with Malfoy." Dean shuddered violently and shook his head several times as if trying to dislodge a particularly horrible image.

"So, put in an appeal." Seamus offered.

"I can't. You heard Isery, you have to be married for three months before you can appeal. Three months! Obviously, the Ministry thinks that by then the contract will be in play and we'll all be so busy being 'physically attracted' to each other that we won't have time to appeal."

Seamus sighed unhappily – he needed to help his friend out here, he could not let Dean marry that Pansy girl.

Dean continued miserably, "Help me, mate. I'm going to end up liking that...thing!"

Seamus looked horrified, "So, what else can you do?"

"Suicide." Dean said bleakly, still sprawled flat out on his stomach across Seamus' bed. His voice was muffled by the pillow.

"No." Seamus said firmly, "Not an option. Next?"

"Kill her." Dean sounded disturbingly delighted with this option, he even managed to lift his head up and grin with terrifying enthusiasm.

"No, no," Seamus interjected hastily, "Next?"

"Escape the country, create a new life in Spain and call myself Sean."

Seamus gave him a weird look, Dean didn't see, his head was already in the pillow again, "No. Next option?"

"Give up my magic, have my mind wiped and go back to being a Muggle."

"Merlin, no, you don't want that. I don't want that. What else?"

"Join one of the underground resistance groups and be a fugitive for the rest of my life, well until the law is abolished."

"It won't be abolished, mate. Everyone knows that. Not this generation anyway, by the time we've all had kids, well…there'll be enough of us to get rid of the law. The resistance groups are starting to give up now, you know that. Anything else?"

"Go to the courts, present a really good case for not marrying her and be assigned someone else."

Dean sat up and slumped uselessly against Seamus' bedroom wall.

"Well…that's a possibility. Anything else you can do?"

"Break into the Ministry, find my contract and burn it." Dean looked thoughtful.

Seamus disagree hurriedly, "You cannot break into the Ministry. It can't be done even Harry didn't manage it. Next?"

"Marry her." Dean looked nauseous.

"Merlin, no. Looks like the court case is all you have. What d'you have to do?"

"There's a really obscure law that means that legally you have to have a hearing before you get married. It's quite new and hardly anyone knows about it; apparently there was a spate of really old betrothal contracts a few years back. People were desperate to get out of them and Fudge made this law. All you gave to do is put in a complaint before the wedding. Even if I lose it, which is likely, it gives me time. About two months worth of time."

"And, we'll think of something else in that time. Something that will get you out of it. I'll help you. Promise." Seamus said fervently – his best mate had been through a lot, he'd had to go on the run when Voldemort was in power, but through it all he'd always managed to be there for Seamus. It was his turn now; he had to be there for Dean, no matter what.

"Thanks mate."

"No problem. Now, how do you put in a complaint?"

"You have to go to the Ministry and go to the Wizengamot offices, you can pick up a form there."

"Well, what are you waiting for? Go get one of those ruddy forms and get out of marrying that...thing."

Dean grinned, clasped hands briefly with his best friend and Apparated to the Ministry.

-

"Oh." The witch at the Wizanegamot offices said distastefully, wrinkling her nose for good measure, "You know about that law."

"Yeah. I did a lot of research." Dean shrugged.

"Oh. I didn't realise people even knew about it." She looked horror struck – obviously the Ministry didn't want anybody using this law to prevent the marriages. Dean had planned on telling everybody about the legal loophole, but, sometimes you had to put yourself first. This was a desperate situation, if they wanted him to keep quiet then he would.

"They don't. I didn't tell anyone, only my mate and he's desperate to marry his fiancée so he won't be using it."

The witch seemed pacified, "Oh, well, I suppose I'll have to give you a form." She ducked under her desk, rummaging through a very small set of drawers. She muttered inaudibly to herself as she did so. Finally, she emerged empty handed and wearing a thoroughly irritated expression.

"Wait there a minute." She said shortly, glaring at him for causing the inconvenience.

She crossed to a larger filing cabinet and unlocked it magically. It creaked open slowly; clearly it was not used often. She stood on tiptoes to reach the top drawer; Dean wanted to laugh but decided that under the present circumstances, it would be a bad idea. Eventually, she seized upon a faded burgundy folder crammed with paper.

She sat back down at her desk at an unhurried pace and opened it. Inside were a number of pieces of parchment, all with lots of tiny writing on. She flicked through; skim reading the headings printed at the top until she seemed to find the right one.

She pulled it out delicately as if it were explosives or something and passed it to him. "Fill it in. Bring it back."

"Have you got a quill?" He asked quickly – no way was he going away, in that time she'd alert a supervisor who would then tell the Minister and by the time he returned the law would have been abolished.

Tutting loudly, she gave him one, rather unwillingly he thought, and then turned her back on him dismissively. He leaned against a small table covered in information pamphlets of varying shades of green.

He filled it in quickly, his writing a messy scribble in his haste to get the words down on paper. A few minutes later, he handed the paper to the witch, permitted himself a smug smile and feeling slightly relieved, Apparated home.

**A/N: OHHH.. a loophole? **

**Just to reassure you, Dean will keep his word - he isn't going to tell anybody about it. I think that Dean would have done absolutely anything to get out of marrying Pansy (who would blame him?) and I don't think that anybody else would have had the time or the persistence to find this loophole...**


	20. Blaise and Hermione 2

**A/N: A Blaise and Hermione chapter for grangergal101, Bergere and Nikki Diamond.**

**Some people have said to me that the title doesn't fit – Marriage, Babies and Hatred, they say that the 'marriage' bit fits and that the 'baby' bit will obviously appear later in the story. But, they say there isn't much 'hatred' – well here's a nice dose of hatred for you all, enjoy!**

**Please keep reviewing and requesting, next chapter will be Draco x Katie and then probably Percy and Cho.**

**Disclaimer: I still don't own any part (or the whole) of Harry Potter. It all belongs to the amazing J..**

Blaise x Hermione  
The Zabini Mansion

Blaise slammed out of the Malfoy Mansion angrily and strode down the drive, his cloak swirling menacingly around him.

He fully intended to go and find that stupid little Mudblood and tell her exactly what he thought of her. She'd disgraced him, she'd embarrassed his family, she wasn't fit to be a Zabini. She was disgusting - but what had he expected? She was a Mudblood, she'd been raised by Muggles and everybody knew that they were practically animals. They had no manners, no class, no dignity.

He continued through the gates, barely pausing to activate the unlocking charm (Draco had entrusted him with the secret to unlocking the gates in Third Year, when they had officially became best friends).

Once beyond the metal gates, now locked firmly behind him, he realised that there was a slight snag in his plans.

He had absolutely no idea where Granger would be. He knew that she was re-taking her final year at Hogwarts – like he was – he also knew that the school summer holidays had been extended until after all the weddings had taken place. McGonagall had refused to let students leave during term time to go and get hitched and so, in defeat, had announced that the students would return on November 1st, when all the ceremonies had taken place.

He remembered someone telling him that Granger didn't live with her parents anymore; he couldn't remember how that had come up in conversation or why exactly he had remembered it.

He had no idea where she would be though, she was eighteen now – old enough to own her own place, she could be anywhere. Although, she was a Muggle born, he didn't think she was from a wealthy family. She probably couldn't afford her own house - where on earth was she? He thought for a moment and then realised that Potter and his lanky friend, Weasel, would probably know where she was. After all, wasn't Potter the one she had been photographed with disgracing herself, and him, in public?

He also realised that he didn't know where they were either. Potter was rumoured to live with the Weasel family in their hovel. It would be very easy for him to find out the Weasel's address, he also knew that he would never ever deign to enter their blood traitor house. Draco had told him that it wasn't really fit to be called a house; apparently it looked like a hovel, was very tiny and was practically falling down.

This created some problems – he didn't know where Granger was (although a small voice in the back of his mind was insistent that she was at the Weasel shack), he didn't know when he would be able to find her, he couldn't bring himself to lower himself to sending her an owl and he couldn't manage to enter the Weasley home in order to ask about her whereabouts.

This was going to be difficult. However, he thought with some pride, a Zabini never gave up. They always got what they wanted – and, what he wanted was to find that stupid little Mudblood. He would find that Mudblood and she would never embarass him and his mother like that again.

He Apparated home, brushed aside his mother's greetings and furious ranting about the Mudblood (although he did manage to catch the words 'I'll Crucio her until she can't even remember her own name! Vile creature! - he didn't think he'd ever heard his mother speak like that before, it made him smile) and locked himself in his bedroom suite. He paced the floor relentlessly, desperately seeking a way to find her. Finally, after every possible solution had been obsessed over and finally dismissed, he realised that he would have to owl her.

'_Granger,_

_Come to mine about eight._

_Blaise Zabini'_

He sent it off with his favourite jet black owl (a very rare and very expensive specimen, even Draco didn't own a black owl) and returned to his frantic pacing.

He wondered if she would reply or if she would even turn up. She'd made no secret of the fact that she hated his house, his mother and him. He wouldn't be surprised if she didn't come. Although, she was a Gryffindor, they were so proud that she wouldn't risk not coming.

-

Hermione frowned as the owl flew onto the windowsill of her and Ginny's room, she recognised it instantly – it was a Zabini owl. She didn't know anyone else who owned such an expensive and showy owl, it had a haughty and imperious manner as if she were in someway beneath it.

She took the letter reluctantly, opening it carefully as if it would explode.

She read it twice and then took a deep breath to calm herself. Who on earth did he think he was? How dare he order her to come to his house? How ruddy dare he?

Ginny entered, took one look at Hermione's face, which was rapidly turning a dangerous shade of red and fled, praying desperately that the cause of Hermione's anger was not the book she had borrowed from her and lost.

Hermione glared at the letter hatefully, wishing it would burst into flames. Or better yet, that Zabini and his stupid mother and stupid house would burn.

Then, she grabbed it angrily and scrawled on the back. Her writing was untidy and she even managed to make a hole in the paper when she dotted the 'I'.

'_Fine. See you then.'_

The owl took it, hooted in a slightly obnoxious way and then flew away.

She was going to go along to his ridiculous 'mansion' and tell Zabini exactly what she thought of him. She would tell him that he couldn't just order her about like that, they weren't married and she was an independent witch. How dare he?

-

At eight o'clock on the dot, she arrived at the bottom of the driveway and marched towards the house self righteously, still seething with barely disguised anger.

A house elf greeted her and took her cloak, it shot her a frightened look and she managed a small smile for it. It looked away instantly as if she had kicked it or something. Clearly the Zabinis were not pleasant to their house elves. Typical. Bloody typical!

Blaise appeared suddenly at the bottom of the stairs and shot her a furious death glare. "What the hell were you thinking?" He yelled, holding up a copy of the Daily Prophet, his hands shaking with sheer rage.

"Oh, that." Hermione grinned, "Just a bit of fun."

"Just a bit of fun! You've brought shame on this family!"

Hermione laughed delightedly – she'd really wound him up…score one to Hermione.

Blaise strode towards her, dark eyes flashing and thrust the paper at her. She reached out to take it reflexively; she looked at the pictures again with a new light in her eyes.

She'd been incredibly embarrassed when the article had been printed. Arthur had brought the paper home from work, shaking with laughter, the Weasley twins looked like Christmas had come early (and spent the last few days teasing her mercilessly and expressing wonder that she, Hermione Granger, know-it-all, good girl, would do such a thing), Percy had found it hilarious, Ginny had informed her in no uncertain terms that she was now planning a girls' night out for the pair of them and Ron had actually been impressed, although a little disappointed they hadn't invited him along. Harry had just laughed. She'd been mortified, wondering what on earth people would think of her. She looked like some common hussy, dancing on bars clearly drunk. She hoped that it wouldn't affect her career options or something...that would be unbearable.

But now, now she knew that it had really enraged Blaise…well now, she was already planning her next night out.

Ron would be thrilled, he and Harry often went for a drink and she always turned down their offers to join them. He always said that she was boring, that she should live a bit more. She was going to be living a whole lot more – all over the tabloids to be precise.

"What were you thinking? How can you even bear to walk the streets? You look so…Muggle!"

This appeared to be the worst insult he could muster, she didn't mind. After all, she had been a Muggle for years, she was used to the insults that this prompted. She was proud of her heritage, she'd achieved everything she'd wanted to despite her birth.

She just smiled at him serenely (noting happily that this blase attitude seemed to enrage Zabini further). "It was just a night out, what's the big deal?"

"The big deal is that you will be a Zabini! You'll have a good name, a decent reputation. You cannot bring shame on us; we have an image to protect. A good, clean image!"

"I like my reputation." Hermione interjected. "And, I don't want to be a Zabini." She spat the word at him, wrinkling her nose in distaste. "What are the Zabini's now? Nothing! Nothing at all." She laughed dismissively, "You old families think you're so special, well you aren't. You're pathetic, you're over. Finished! Don't you see? The big names now are Potter and Weasley and Longbottom and Lupin and Lovegood and…Granger." She smiled at him laughingly, revulsion clear in her eyes as she met his gaze.

Blaise took a step back and hissed with anger. "The Zabini name is a good one. You disgust me."

She threw her head back and laughed. "And you, Zabini, make me sick. Go to hell!"

She turned on her heel and swept imperiously towards the door, turning suddenly to say, "And if you ever order me around again, it'll be the last thing you do."

She left. Blaise punched the doorframe angrily, leaving no mark against the solid wood and causing his knuckles to split and bleed. He roared with pain and rage and stormed upstairs again, vowing that Hermione sodding Granger was going to pay. Pay dearly – no one insulted the Zabini name and got away with it, especially not disgusting little Mudbloods like her.

-

Hermione Apparated directly into The Burrow and grinned at Harry and Ron who were sprawled across the sofas. "Fancy going out tonight?"

"Abso-bloody-lutely."


	21. Draco and Katie 3

**A/N: As requested by marym19 and Bergere a Draco and Katie chapter. Sorry I haven't updated for a couple of days – been slightly distracted with some family stuff and then the site wouldn't let me upload for a few days (I have no idea why?).**

**Anyway, I am now back at school so daily updates will probably become a thing of the past - sorry! I will try and update as much as possible.**

**Please keep reading and reviewing – I still take any requests!**

**Disclaimer: I'm bored of these now; I will never ever own Harry Potter.**

Draco x Katie  
The Malfoy Mansion

"Mother." Draco drawled lazily, striding through the hallway as if he owned the place. Actually, Katie realised, he did pretty much own the place. He removed his cloak and dropped it in the general direction of a house elf who darted forwards with surprising agility to catch it. He helped Katie take her coat off, she glared at him angrily – she didn't need help, she could take her own coat off.

Narcissa Malfoy was perched on the corner of an arm chair in the drawing room. The room was grand and luxurious and sumptuous but Katie instinctively hated it. The sheer opulence ruined any sense of homeliness or comfort the room may once have held.

Katie looked around nervously; she wondered whether You-Know-Who had ever sat in here, if he had made his plans to kill her friends in this room, if he had…killed in this room. She pushed the terrifying thoughts from her mind quickly, forcing herself to concentrate.

Narcissa stood up gracefully; Katie noted that she was wearing a dress. A proper, floor length dress, most pure blood families lived in wizarding robes. It was black, well cut and obviously expensive. "Katie, welcome. I have heard much about you." Narcissa extended one pale hand elegantly and Katie took it.

Katie wondered if she actually had heard anything about her or if she was just being polite. "Nice to meet you, Mrs Malfoy."

"Narcissa, please." Narcissa smiled indulgently.

"Mother, is dinner ready?" Draco interjected with the attitude of a whiny child.

Narcissa nodded, "Of course darling, I was just waiting for you."

Draco turned to Katie and took her arm. Katie stiffened but realised that with Narcissa's cool eyes on her she could not react. Later, however, she was going to hex his arm off. Or maybe a certain other part of his anatomy…

The dining room was huge. She could have fitted her entire flat inside it with heaps of room left over, in fact, she could have put the whole block of flats in comfortably. The table was made of a rich, dark wood and had no fewer than twenty four chairs arranged around it.

At the far end three places were laid although she noted that the chair at the head of the table was not set. Clearly Lucius Malfoy was still head of the household, despite currently residing in Azkaban.

A house elf appeared seemingly from thin air and pulled out the chairs for them to sit at. Katie thanked her profusely, even daring to smile in a friendly way; Narcissa's pale eyebrows rose dramatically into her hairline. The house elf just looked at its' feet for a brief second and then disappeared.

Katie smothered a grin – she was going to do absolutely everything in her power to shake up the straight laced, rule abiding, class minding Malfoys.

Draco resided over the table, evidently in the absence of his father he was the alpha male. He had a casually arrogant manner, she understood it – this was his home, he was an only child and clearly rather spoiled and used to getting his own way.

She wondered if she had actually dug herself deeper into the hole by rejecting him at the Ministry meeting. After all, what is more exciting to those who have everything than something they cannot hope to possess?

Katie found herself drinking a rich red wine which Draco had served – he'd announced imperiously the name of the wine (clearly, she was supposed to be impressed), the year it was from (cue more wonder) and that house elves were not to be trusted with pouring such a wine.

She'd smothered the part of her which wanted to scream at him and hex him into oblivion for his attitude towards the house elves. She knew that most Pureblood families, usually the rich ones, felt nothing but contempt and disdain towards their house elves. It irritated her. When she lived here, for she realised that she had no choice and that living in the Malfoy mansion was a given, she was going to 'accidentally' free some of the house elves.

She almost laughed out loud at the idea of the Malfoy house elves all walking out clutching socks and pants, Narcissa and Draco forced to stand aside and watch.

"Something funny?" Narcissa commented lightly as the house elves served some sort of starter. She couldn't even begin to tell what it was – it looked delicious though.

"Oh no." Katie lied.

"Well, dear, after dinner we simply must start on the wedding plans."

Katie just nodded, feeling a rising sense of dread. The wedding was going to be huge and expensive and horrible. Okay, everyone worth knowing would attend, she would have everything she wanted, the best of everything but her husband would be Draco Malfoy, therefore ruining her dream of the perfect wedding.

The meal continued in a drowning silence, she wondered if this was a regular occurrence. Something told her that the Malfoys were not the sort to gossip about their respective days over dinner and tell stupid jokes like her family used to. Maybe talking was considered rude or something.

The food was delicious of course, she hadn't expected anything less. She was also drinking much more than she usually would and Draco kept filling up her glass wordlessly. She was aware that she was slightly tipsy and that this had not been part of her plan. She needed to be sober to get through this night.

She also noticed that Narcissa seemed to eat enough to nourish a sparrow – evidently not eating properly was an unspoken rule. In defiance, Katie cleared her plate every time.

Finally, after several lengthy courses served with a deafening, screaming silence, the very long dinner drew to a close.

Narcissa rose, dropped her napkin delicately onto the table and swept towards the doorway. "Come, Katie dear, we will go to the lounge. It is much more comfortable."

Draco pulled her chair out for her carefully and held out his hand for her to take. "Just take it." He said impatiently when she merely looked at his hand with something approaching disgust, "You'll need it. You won't be able to walk straight." He sounded amused.

She glared at him. "I'm not drunk."

She took his hand, managed to stand, wobbled slightly and inwardly cursed herself. Draco smirked at her contradiction.

"I'm not that drunk." She admitted in a quieter voice.

"Good girl, you can hold your drink." He actually sounded…impressed.

"Yes thanks." She dismissed abruptly, painfully aware that her sharp retort was completely ruined by the very fact that she was clinging to his arm like she was drowning or something.

He escorted her into the lounge and helped her onto the sofa. The longue was admittedly the most comfortable looking room she had seen in the house so far. It was clearly a woman's room and was decorated mostly in shades of pink (all muted tones of course, a bold pink would have been far too brash for Narcissa Malfoy), lighter woods and silk, lots of silk.

Narcissa smiled happily as Draco sat next to Katie and threw his arm along the top of the sofa. She called for a house elf to bring coffee (Draco requested whisky, 'to pep up the coffee' he had said when Narcissa had looked disapproving) and asked another to bring her 'the books'.

'The books' turned out to be a series of wedding catalogues and a clipboard. The catalogues all had pages marked in them and on the clipboard were a few pages of notes written in a neat script and what appeared to be some sort of timetable of events.

"I have been planning this wedding ever since the law was introduced." Narcissa explained softly, "Otherwise there would be nothing and no-one good left and a Malfoy always has the best. Lucius wrote to say that he will pay for anything we require, he's terribly sorry that he cannot actually attend the wedding. He will return fairly soon anyhow."

Katie nodded absent mindedly. She just wanted to go home. The evening had been dull and she dreaded having to return.

Then Narcissa's words sunk in – she was talking about her husband as if he were away on business or something, as if he had not been sentenced publicly by the Wizengamot to fifteen years in Azkaban, as if every member of the wizarding world did not know what terrible crimes Lucius had committed.

"Now, we must go shopping for your dress. Obviously you can't have anything from the racks but it would be a good idea, I think, to see what the latest styles are and then we'll have one custom made…"

Katie zoned out, nodding every now and then to give the illusion of listening to Narcissa's monologue, thinking morose thoughts about her new life.

She wasn't ever going to fall in love and marry a husband whom she loved. Her husband didn't love her, never would. He might desire her at the moment because he couldn't have her, but once they were married she would be forced to like him and any attraction she currently held for him would instantly cease.

She would have to live in this cold cold house where no one laughed or joked or chatted. Where there were strict protocols and unspoken rules. Where an army of house elves waited on the family hand and foot without ever receiving a word of thanks. Where love did not exist, where family was more about the name than companionship and genuine liking and where one's reputation must be preserved at all costs. Where money could buy you everything, except true happiness, where nothing was comfortable or out of place and where the women were seen but not heard.

A feeling akin to suffocation rose over her, she couldn't breathe. Her lungs constricted painfully. She couldn't breathe…she couldn't get enough air into her lungs. She was aware that her breathing was quickened and that Draco was looking at her worriedly.

Draco touched her hand gently, "You okay?" He murmured in her ear.

Narcissa didn't seem to notice, engrossed as she was in pictures of wedding flowers. "Lilies, I think dear, perhaps mixed with pink roses to add a touch of colour…."

Katie shook her head and announced loudly, "I need to get home now."

Narcissa looked startled; Katie had interrupted her, clearly something that had never happened to her before.

She seemed to recover herself quickly, "Of course dear, it is late. Please do come again soon." She took Katie's hand and squeezed it briefly before perching on the edge of her chair again. Katie wondered if the woman ever sat back in her chair or slouched across the sofa, or, God forbid, actually sat comfortably. She thought not.

Draco led her to the door, "Let me Apparate you home. You don't look like you'll be able to get there by yourself."

"No, no…" She protested weakly still feeling dizzy and panicked. "I'll be fine when I get outside. Honest."

He raised an eyebrow, took a firmer grip on her arm and Apparated directly to her front door.

"Goodbye." She said stiffly, pulling away from him and reaching for the door handle.

He stopped her by throwing an arm across the doorframe and smirking happily, "Good night, darling. See you tomorrow."

"Tomorrow?"

"You and Mother are having tea together, you promised her." Draco reminded her in a casually light tone.

"I didn't." She denied hotly – she had no memory of making any such promise.

"You really did." He told her firmly, "You'd better be there, and if you don't attend then I'll come and get you. Mother doesn't take disappointment well and for her lateness is the very epitome of rudeness. Good night, darling."

He turned and strode away; she heard a small pop as he Apparated back home. She groaned – tea with Narcissa, Merlin help her.


	22. Seamus and Parvati 1

**A/N: A Seamus and Parvati chapter (I think, the very first chapter featuring these two) as requested by Whisperheart and hermionesw.**

**Read, review and request. Thanks.**

**Disclaimer: Still ain't mine.**

Seamus x Parvati

The Wedding

He'd never ever been this terrified, ever – and he'd had some pretty scary moments in his life. He'd fought in the Hogwarts Battle for Merlin's sake and yet…this topped it by far. Butterflies danced violent patterns in his stomach.

_She was so nervous. So, so nervous. She'd never felt like this before, she was scared and nervous and panicky and perversely…thrilled. She wanted to collapse with nerves and then jump for joy._

He didn't even know why he was so scared; after all she would turn up. He knew she would. And, he wasn't regretting this decision, not one tiny bit. It was the best day of his life so far, easy. He was happy to be doing this, so very happy. He didn't know what would happen next, but it wouldn't matter because she would be with him, he couldn't even plead fear of the unknown. He breathed deeply, trying to calm his nerves.

_She couldn't quite explain some of those feelings. Happiness was easy to explain, she was supposed to be happy. But scared? Why? She didn't know why she was scared, she wanted this. She had always wanted this; this was the best decision of her life._

Dean was sitting next to him, perched on one of these spindly little chairs that she had loved and he had thought would just crumble. His best friend clapped his shoulder manfully, "Alright mate?"

"Yeah." He nodded and then seeing Dean's disbelieving look decided to just go with the truth. "No."

Dean smiled, "It'll all be fine. Honest."

"I know." Seamus admitted shakily. He turned to Dean and hugged him suddenly, "Brothers always, yeah?"

"Course." Dean said simply.

_Lavender drew her aside from the other two for a moment, pretending to adjust her dress for her. "Good luck." She said quickly._

_Parvati smiled back, "Thanks, love you."_

"_You too, always." Lavender hugged her briefly, carefully avoiding crushing her dress and then the pair made their way back to Cho and Padma who were ready and waiting for them by the church doors._

Music struck up, seemingly from thin air, and Seamus leapt to his feet instantly as if he had been stung. Dean rose as well at a more normal pace and wearing a bemused expression.

_Suddenly, the music started. Merlin, it was time. Her father took her hand, smiled at her, tears visible in his eyes and the doors opened magically._

He could see so many people he knew – his Ma, bedecked in her brand new robes and beaming with pride, the entire Weasley family (they actually took up three rows alone), Harry, who waved at him cheerfully, Hermione, Michael, Justin Finch-Fletchey, who he actually didn't like but Parvati had insisted attend, Neville and Hannah, whom he noted looked blissfully happy and so many other familiar faces.

He knew every single person here; he could practically feel their eyes on him. He wondered for a split second how far he could get before someone stopped him and dragged him back up here.

Why was he thinking like that? He wanted this. He was pleased to be here, thrilled, ecstatic, jumping for joy.

Suddenly the music changed slightly and he recognised the cue, he turned to the doorway and there she was.

She was looking at her father, who was mouthing something at her. Three of her friends accompanied her – Lavender who had been her best friend for years, her twin sister Padma and Cho Chang a more recent friend. They all wore dresses, not robes – she hadn't wanted robes – in very pale blue. They looked like flowers, he thought in a sudden fit of poetry.

_Her dad led her forwards into the church; she could hear her heels clacking against the floor. She could see so many people, so many old friends, new friends, relations. They were smiling and 'ooh'ing and 'aah'ing. Her dad pressed gently on her arm, signalling her attention. He mouthed 'I love you.' She smiled, tears welling up in her eyes. From the corner of her eyes, she could just see the blue skirts of her friends. Three of her best friends, she was glad they were here to share her moment._

She had a white dress on, of course. He thought it looked really nice, dead nice. Nothing compared to her of course. She was beauty personified.

She looked up then and met his eyes, he grinned instantly and she smiled shyly back. He couldn't wait for the short walk to be over; he wanted her to be his. Officially.

_She met his eyes and all of a sudden the aisle seemed too long. She wanted to be there, with him, in his arms. If her dad hadn't had hold of her arm, she probably would have sprinted towards him. She restrained herself and just smiled at him. She could wait a few seconds, after all – they'd have forever._

He'd liked her for years, as a mate of course. They'd been in the same house, spent a lot of time together. Although, up until fourth year he'd never really thought of her _like that_.

_They'd been sorted into the same house and never really spoken in first year. They'd only been eleven then and very very allergic to members of the opposite sex. They'd become friends in the second year though, good friends. She'd never thought about him any other way though; she was about as attracted to him as she was to say… her brother._

He was always more interested in Lavender, they'd gone to the Yule Ball together where Lavender had informed him mid dance that she liked him very much as a friend and knew that he felt the same but that she thought Parvati had some interest. Proper interest. He'd been startled; it was entirely out of the blue. Lavender had just smiled and made him promise to ask her best friend out one day. It had taken him three years to pluck up the courage to actually do it. Three long years.

_She'd been so surprised when he'd asked Lavender to the Yule Ball. She wasn't surprised that he'd asked Lavender or anything, it was her feelings that shocked her. She was…jealous. The feelings were very unwelcome, she didn't know why she was feeling like this. He was just a friend. Lavender was her best friend, her very best friend and she tried so very hard to be happy for her._

In those years he had taken more notice of her than ever before and found that he liked what he saw. She was beautiful of course, but she was kind and funny and generous. In short, she was the sort of girl he'd like to be with.

_They'd grown closer after the Ball. Lavender had told her that Seamus and her were just friends, she'd said it with a knowing look in her eye as if Lavender, somehow, had guessed her secret. She'd been too embarrassed to say anything, not even to her best friend. Although, she realised now, that she'd never needed to, Lavender knew her better than anyone. He'd actually taken the time to talk to her, waited for her after class, walked her to lessons, sat with her in the common room. Lavender had teased her saying that he really liked her. She just blushed and laughed but secretly…she really really hoped that Lavender was right._

At the Hogwarts Battle he'd been frantic with worry when he couldn't find her, finally spying her battling valiantly against a masked Death Eater, he'd dashed in to help her and had a sort of epiphany. He couldn't go on liking her and not acting on it – life was too short, far too short to hold back. Just hours after Harry had won, he'd asked her. She'd said yes and it had all gone from there.

_At the final Battle, she'd been so scared. Most of all though, she'd been worried for him, she'd prayed desperately that he would be okay. She'd realised that actually it wasn't just desire or innocent liking between them, she might…well, love him and those thoughts scared her, scared her so much. Of course, when he'd asked her out she'd said yes instantly, the scared thoughts disappearing quickly. She'd never told him how long she'd been in love with him – but she thought that he probably had already guessed._

They'd been together for a while now and they'd be together for a lot lot longer. They were supposed to be together. She liked to tell him (and everyone else) that they were soul mates, he didn't know if he believed in that sort of stuff but if that's what she wanted to think, well he wasn't going to argue about it.

_They were soul mates, destined to be together. No one could argue with that. She knew that he didn't really believe it, he just thought that they were in love. But then, it always was much nicer to add a bit of glamour to things._

She was nearly here now, nearly in his arms. He felt Dean pat his shoulder and then step back slightly. He didn't even turn to acknowledge his best mate, he couldn't. He couldn't tear his eyes away from her.

_She was so close to him, so very close. She couldn't look away; she could hardly feel her dad's hand or the gentle touches of her friends. All she could see was him._

Her father placed her hand in his and all his fears melted away. This was right. It had to be. They were meant to be together.

_Finally, Dad placed my hand into his and everything was fine. The world seemed clearer, my vision brightened. This was right, this was intended, this was something very special._

He barely heard the spoken words, barely made his cues, never looked away from her.

_She couldn't look away from him, she was drowning in his gaze. She just about managed to get her words out in the right place, she wasn't even sure she cared very much that she jumbled them a bit and nearly missed her cue a few times. She might regret it later, be embarrassed about her mistakes in years to come but right now, right now she couldn't care less._

Finally, eventually, the service was over and they were married. Man and wife. She belonged to him, they belonged together.

_It was over. She was his. She was his wife. She belonged to him, finally._

He leaned it carefully to kiss her and then turned to face the audience. They clapped and cheered and grinned and waved and threw a storm of pink rice.

_He leaned in to kiss her and she responded instantly. Then, he put his arm around her waist and turned to face their family and friends. They were all cheering and applauding. They threw rice, dyed pink especially at her request. It was a perfect moment._

He sighed with relief, it was all over. All over, and he was…married. Married to the most beautiful, most perfect, most amazing woman alive – Parvati Finnigan.

_She felt him sigh happily and wanted to do the same. It was all over, the wedding was over and now she was a married woman. She wasn't Parvati Patil, she was Parvati Finnigan – world's luckiest (and most ecstatic) woman._

**A/N: Just in case you hadn't realised - Seamus' POV is the normal font, Parvati is the italics.**


	23. Percy and Cho 2

**A/N: Percy and Cho for Nikki Diamond. Please keep reviewing !**

**Tomorrow (or Sunday at the latest) I will get a George x Luna chapter up because everyone seems to love them. In fact, I'm considering doing a GeorgexLuna story separately. Anyone want to read anything like that? Let me know.**

**Disclaimer: I still do not own Harry Potter. And, to be perfectly honest, I will never ever own Harry Potter.**

Percy x Cho  
The Burrow

Cho knocked on the door once and hastily took a large step back. On her second visit to the Weasley household, the door had opened unexpectedly as she reached out to knock. The Weasley twins had dashed out cackling wickedly, Mrs Weasley's screams following them and knocked her clean off of her feet. They'd apologised profusely and seemed very sorry but she knew that they'd all laughed about it behind her back. They didn't like her. None of them did. She knew that full well. She didn't care, much, after all – they were nothing and she didn't need their 'approval'. She didn't even want to be part of their stupid family.

She knew that she'd never really fit in with them. To be one of them, you had to – be an actual Weasley, have red hair, be an orphan or have an absent parent/s, appear to be malnourished or be a Muggleborn. She was none of these things, she just didn't fit in. And, if she had her way, she never would.

Being a Weasley had not been on her agenda. For a brief period, she'd thought about being a Potter and what that would entail. It had seemed preferable to being a Weasley. So, sure all the magazines reckoned that Weasley was the second most powerful name in the wizarding world…not for her it wasn't. And she was marrying the loser one – Percy. It made her want to shudder just thinking about it.

He was boring and dull and bookish. He was devoted to his idiotic family. He put up with all their teasing, he actually found it funny. She didn't. She thought that the Weasley twins were immature and irresponsible and needed to grow up and stop playing stupid pranks. She thought it was just plain rude that they played tricks on unsuspecting pranks. She thought it was very mean of them all to allow the pranks to be played, for their guests to be humiliated and then to actually laugh at the victim instead of defending her. Even Harry had laughed. She'd thought he liked her, at least enough not to laugh at her and mock her and tease her.

She'd obviously thought wrong.

Today, however, she was supposed to be arriving for lunch with Mrs Weasley and Percy. They'd told her no one else was going to be about. This was good. They were going to have lunch, discuss wedding plans and chat a little. She reckoned that she could be in and out in ninety minutes.

The plans wouldn't take long; she'd done most of them with the help of her best friends. She didn't expect Molly or Percy to have any disagreements with them, they were perfectly acceptable. Not too flashy (she'd noticed that the Weasley's were not 'flashy' in any way), not over the top or ridiculously expensive (again, not their cup of tea at all) and really, quite modest in every way. Lavender had planned a massive extravaganza – the ultimate wedding of the year, she had said – Parvati was having a really lovely wedding, but then she was marrying someone she loved and Seamus had given her full control over everything wedding related, Padma was also marrying a Weasley (her one consolation – at least she'd have someone to talk to at family functions) and had said immediately that she didn't want any fuss. Cho didn't want any fuss either. She wanted an actual wedding, just nothing fancy; after all it wasn't a celebration for her. It was just…something that had to be done.

Finally, the door opened and a flustered Molly Weasley stood at the doorstep. She wore her customary apron which, Cho noted, had a large scorch mark down the front. Her hair appeared to be wilder than ever.

"Cho, dear." She said wearily.

"Hello." Cho said warily, looking around carefully for any signs of mischief. She was not going to be humiliated today.

"Come in, come in." Molly turned and walked back into the kitchen. She didn't offer to take Cho's coat or ask her if she wanted a drink. She didn't even say she was glad to see her. In fact, Cho thought, she probably wasn't pleased to see her at all.

Ginny sat at the kitchen table, her hands clasped protectively around a steaming mug of tea. She looked like she had been crying. An ironing board was set up in one corner of the kitchen, a pile of neatly folded clothes on the table and crumpled ones in an over flowing basket on the floor. Mrs Weasley returned to her ironing, chattering to Ginny as she did so. It seemed that Ginny was suffering from awful nightmares about the War. The Battle had hit them all hard and left them all with invisible (and in some cases, visible) scars, Cho herself had had some pretty horrific dreams for weeks afterwards.

Cho helped herself to a seat, realising that she wasn't going to be offered one. The back door opened suddenly and Arthur appeared looking confused and muttering to himself inaudibly.

"Molly, dear, have you seen my new cloak? Only I have to go soon and I can't find it. It's not in the shed." He complained.

"It's in the airing cupboard, Dad." Ginny interjected tearfully.

Arthur nodded in gratitude and left. Cho resisted the urge to tut loudly – it seemed that they were, in fact, not alone. And, judging by various sounds from upstairs – the whole lot were here.

"Percy isn't here yet, it's not his lunch break until two." Ginny said helpfully, wiping her eyes with a crumpled tissue.

Cho groaned inwardly. She'd arrived at one, presuming that Percy would be in at about that time. She was going to be stuck here for ages waiting for him.

Ron strode into the room brandishing a huge armful of dirty Quidditch robes. "Mum, can you wash these for me and Harry, please?"

"Yes, of course. Just put them down." Molly stopped and looked around hopefully, Cho gazed about her as well – there was absolutely no space anywhere in the cluttered kitchen. "Just…just…over there." She finished lamely.

"Where's 'over there'?" Ron persisted.

"Just there." Molly pointed at a lone chair stood in a corner.

Ron dumped them unceremoniously down and left, without even acknowledging Cho's presence. Cho was a little offended; he'd acted like she was…the table leg or something. How rude! She was more offended that Molly hadn't even chided him about his manners, typical Weasley's.

Although, she thought, Molly did look rushed off of her feet. Ginny was crying, Arthur was hunting for his missing cloak, she had a massive pile of ironing, Cho could hear very small explosions coming from upstairs, the kettle was on, a huge pot of soup bubbled merrily on the stove, Ron and Harry clearly did not know how to do their own washing…it was a mad house. She shuddered at the thought of living here. She would go insane. Actually mental. She knew it; she had already discussed with Percy (in one of only two conversations they had actually had) the fact that she was not going to live here. She would rent herself a flat and live there. If he needed to see her, well, he'd have to Apparate or something. She didn't want to live here, in this house. He hadn't actually seemed to care, an unwelcome fact, she'd hoped he would insist on it or at least seem a bit hurt at her decision. He'd just nodded and shrugged, then turned away and started a conversation with Hermione.

It seemed to her that no one wanted to talk to her. She'd been to four Weasley dinners on various nights. The first time had been okay because Lavender had turned up unexpectedly, the second time she'd been alone and ignored and hurt and angry and vowed never to come again. She'd been along the third time with Padma, who had pleaded with her for three days because she didn't want to go it alone. She'd finally relented. The fourth time she'd been alone again, Hermione had been quite nice but eventually even she had drifted away. Cho had left early. No one had noticed.

She sat in complete silence for ninety agonising minutes as – Harry and Ron left with the twins to play two-a-side Quidditch (without even saying hello), Ginny had cried some more and then disappeared upstairs, Arthur finally found his cloak and went to work, Neville and Hannah stopped by for a quick cup of tea and a chat before they went to look at wedding venues, Luna had appeared in the fireplace to say that she'd love to come over for dinner (Molly had been delighted to see her, Cho noted jealously), Fred had returned from Quidditch, showered and then Apparated over to Angelina's, Molly had completed her ironing, added a huge amount of potatoes and carrots to her pot of soup (although it was more of a stew now), put away some of the ironing and begun to make some lunch up for everyone who was still about.

Finally, an owl flew into the kitchen and squawked impatiently. Cho jumped visibly. Molly didn't bat an eyelid.

"Cho dear, could you just get that for me?" Molly had said as she juggled stirring her stew and pouring tea all at the same time.

Cho crossed the disorganised kitchen, dodging piles of clothing and a lone broomstick, to the owl and took the proffered letter.

'_Mum,_

_Please can you tell Cho I'm really sorry but I'm too busy for lunch._

_Should make it back in time for dinner._

_Percy.'_

She read it. Twice. Thrice. It didn't seem to be sinking in. He wasn't coming. He was too busy to see her. She was here for nothing.

"What is it?" Molly asked casually, not even looking up at Cho.

Cho inhaled shakily, suppressing her anger. "It's from Percy. He's not coming."

"Oh dear." Molly said absent mindedly. "Never mind, another time then. Did you want to stay for lunch?"

"No thank you." Cho replied coldly, she turned on her heel and left very quickly. No one said goodbye to her.

She was angry, really angry. She'd been stuck there alone and unwelcome waiting for him and then he'd just…bailed on her.

She had half a mind to go and confront him. In fact, thinking about it, that was exactly what she was going to do. She was going to go to the Ministry and tell him exactly what she thought of him and his stupid family and inexcusable manners and boring bloody job…she would give him a piece of her mind. No one blew her off like that.

**A/N: Mneh, I don't really like Cho. I promise I'll be nicer later. At the moment, however, I prefer to make her horrible!**


	24. George and Luna 3

**A/N: As promised a George and Luna chapter, requested by grangergal101 and Bergere and Pilks.**

**This is fluffy. Very fluffy and maybe a bit cliché. I just thought it felt right for them though. I wrote it in George's point of view because I tried it in Luna's and it just felt wrong. **

**Keep reviewing and requesting – I will write whichever couples you want to see!**

**Almost forgot, a massive thank you to everyone who has reviewed. I now have over 100 reviews – I was so so pleased when I found out. Another huge thanks to everyone who sent their condolences about my Grandsha, you really made me smile, thank you.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter, never have and never will.**

George x Luna  
The Cave

George scrambled eagerly over the jumbled rocks, rain dripping miserably onto his head and running down his long nose, stumbling and almost falling in his haste to get out of the rain and to his destination – the cave. It had formerly been a hiding place solely for the use of the Weasley twins; however he now regarded it as his and Luna's cave. Fred had somewhat unwillingly been forced to renounce his claim on it.

The cave was their secret meeting place. It was somewhere they could meet up, nearly every day, and talk together, laugh together and get to know each other. They spent hours discussing everything and anything, paying no attention to the time and having to make a mad dash to get home before dinner. More importantly, it was somewhere they could be together away from the prying and mocking eyes of their friends and family. They just didn't understand.

His own twin regarded it the whole thing as a joke. He was a little hurt by it all, after all Fred was his twin. He had thought that Fred, of all people, would understand, would accept them.

So yeah, they were an unusual couple, but they'd fallen in love, simple as that. You couldn't choose who you fell in love with, it wasn't even really your choice, it just happened. He hadn't intended to fall for her. He hadn't ever dreamed that they'd be together. It was unexpected and startling and difficult but he wouldn't change it for the world.

She wasn't there when he arrived. That was quite normal, she was always late. It was an irritating quirk of hers. He would drive himself mad wondering whether she was going to turn up or if she'd sent an owl and he'd missed it. He'd pace the cramped space frantically, convincing himself that she wasn't coming, that she wouldn't show, that she didn't even like him. He was always wrong, she always did show. He'd intend to be mad at her and tell her that she should be on time but then she'd smile at him and say something completely unpredictable and he'd just find himself smiling inanely instead.

She had a weird and unnerving effect on him. He wanted to make her smile; when she did smile he would find the corners of his mouth lifting in response, without even meaning to. He loved being with her, he found it odd when she wasn't there. He could imagine their whole life together, could practically see the children they would have. He wanted desperately to please her, couldn't bear the thought of her ever being unhappy or in pain. He thought that this feeling, well, it might even be love and that really scared him.

He wasn't ready for love. He was a Weasley for Merlin's sake, he was a young man, he part owned a successful business. He should, you know, play the field a bit. But, technically, 'the field' was empty now. Everyone he would have flirted with and maybe had a few dates with was about to be married. It was a disconcerting situation the wizarding world found itself in. You could walk into a bar, any wizarding bar, and find it completely empty. Landlords across the country were furious; the Ministry had alienated their whole clientele with the new law. After all, why would any young person bother going to a bar if they were already married? That's what bars and clubs were basically for, after all, finding a suitable partner.

He thought he might have found his. He planned on telling her soon. So far they had never discussed their feelings for each other. Although he thought she liked him back - she did always accept his invitations to meet up and sometimes she'd asked him if he wanted to go out somewhere. He thought that was a good sign. They held hands a lot, not a big deal usually in a relationship but with Luna it felt like something significant. Like when her hand was in his, they were truly together. It felt natural to take her hand in his and yet, like a massive decision as well, like he was embarking on something huge.

He prayed that the twin bond didn't stretch to reading embarrassing private thoughts. Fred would have a field day if he could see his brother like this – worrying like a girl about whether she would turn up, pondering whether he loved her and waxing lyrical about holding hands. Pathetic really, George thought, but he knew that he wouldn't want it any other way.

Luna and him were different to other couples. Fred and Angelina, for example, were far more traditional. They'd actually dated casually before they'd been matched, they went out for dinner all the time and they were together with increasing frequency. Fred had told her he loved her and Angie had said it back (and then proceeded to talk about it all the time, boasting to her friends and constantly badgering George to find out about Fred's 'true feelings' for her), they kissed and hugged and Angie seemed to be permanently draped over Fred. They were the stereotypical newly-in-love couple.

Luna wasn't like that though. He'd only ever kissed her on the cheek. She wasn't into big flashy public displays of affection. She wouldn't like it if he told her he loved her all the time. He didn't mind though. She was absolutely perfect for him and if that's what she wanted, then so did he.

She appeared suddenly at the entrance of the cave, interrupting his pacing and wearing her customary smile. She crossed to him with light steps, dripping water as she went. She was soaked – her hair was plastered to her head and her robes and skin were covered in tiny droplets of water.

"Hello." She said simply, sitting down next to him on a jagged boulder.

"Hey," he replied, beaming from ear to ear like a real idiot. She probably thought he was a fool – this was new for him, actually caring, properly caring, what a girl thought of him.

"Isn't it a lovely day?"

George raised an eyebrow. "Have you seen the weather?"

"I like rain."

It didn't surprise him. Luna was unconventional in every way possible. "Why?" He was genuinely curious. He wanted to know everything about her, understand her completely.

"It's beautiful. Watch how it falls." She took his hand easily, pulled him to his feet and to the mouth of the small cave.

She linked her fingers through his and pointed with the other hand at the landscape. "See how it falls down. It spirals down. See."

George looked. It didn't look all that beautiful to him. He didn't say so, he just nodded.

"Let's go out."

He chuckled briefly and then realised she was serious. "But it's raining."

"Yes." She seemed to see no problems at all.

To hell with it then, he was going to live a little. She wanted to dance in the rain? Well, so did he. "Come on then." She smiled happily and he knew instantly that he had made the right decision.

They ran out into the rain and dashed down the rocks, clasping hands tightly as they slipped and slid their way down. The rain seemed to get heavier and heavier. The skies had turned a murky, resentful grey.

Once they reached the field at the back of The Burrow, Luna dropped his hand and dashed away. She threw her arms out wide and spun around giddily. He was suddenly struck by her beauty. She stopped suddenly and tilted her head back, he watched as a single drop of rain fell into her slightly open mouth. She giggled like a little girl and started running again, twisting and moving in a peculiar yet entrancing dance.

He joined her, spreading his arms wide and running. Just running. He felt oddly free. It felt right to be here, with her, playing in the rain like two toddlers. She made him lose all his inhibitions, he didn't care what he looked like or that someone could be watching from The Burrow. He was living. And it felt good.

They ran and looped and spiralled in dizzying circles, laughing occasionally for no apparent reason other that they could. Eventually, they tired themselves out and found themselves leant against each other, her hand having found its way into his. The rain continued to fall steadily around them.

He looked at her for a long moment, gazing into her eyes, smiling unconsciously. He felt like something needed to be said, the moment needed to continue for a little while longer. "I love you." The words tumbled from his mouth before he could stop them. He was startled at them, he hadn't meant to actually tell her that. Not yet.

She nodded matter of factly, "I love you too, George."

She loved him. She loved him! He was escastic, over the moon, thrilled. It took all his willpower not to jump up and down for sheer joy. Although, he knew that she wouldn't mind if he did. Still, he'd prefer to retain a little of his dignity.

Then, unexpectedly, she reached up onto her tiptoes and pressed her lips against his for a brief, too short moment.

He stood frozen for a long minute in shock. She'd kissed him? She'd kissed him! She giggled, breaking the moment, and dashed away, dancing in the rain again.

He grinned, she really was perfect.


	25. Lee and Ginny 3

**A/N: A Lee and Ginny chapter for grangergal101 and Whisperheart. This one doesn't have Lee in it, or Lee and Ginny together, they should be together in the next one.**

**Keep reviewing and requesting!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, however I do own a copy of all of the books. Yay.**

Lee x Ginny  
The Burrow

She didn't even know why she was feeling like this. After all, this was no big deal. She was getting married. No biggie. Honest.

Okay, it was a big deal. She was nervous, so nervous and she didn't even know why. After all, she didn't actually love Lee. They were just friends and that was it. They were being forced into marriage, so…why would she feel nervous? You were only supposed to be nervous if you were in love with your fiancée and eager to be married. She wasn't.

The whole idea of her future scared her but that was understandable. She didn't know what would happen in her future – obviously she would be Lee's wife, Mrs Ginevra Jordan. That sounded horrible. It didn't even fit properly, Ginny Weasley just sat better together, it sounded right. Ginny Jordan, no, just not right.

She was going to have his children as well, she would have to. She wouldn't have a choice in the matter. She would be a mother in just a few short years. It was a scary thought – she wasn't old enough to have kids. She was nowhere near old enough, she hadn't even finished school.

She wasn't ready to be married. She wasn't emotionally ready, her head wasn't in the right place, she hadn't finished with the single life yet, hadn't even started her life properly yet. None of these arguments would make a difference. She was going to be married, today.

Today, she was Ginevra Molly Weasley. She was a student at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. She was free and single. She was still the baby of the family. She still had a crush on Harry Potter. Okay, she was in love with one Harry James Potter.

Tomorrow, she would be Ginevra Molly Jordan, wife of Lee Jordan. She would still go to Hogwarts, she would always be the youngest of the Weasleys but she wouldn't be single. And, she could certainly not still be in love with Harry.

Harry was marrying Lavender. Ginny loathed her. Harry was supposed to be with her, Ginny. They'd dated for a few months at Hogwarts, been so in love and then he'd had to leave her to defeat You-Know-Who. It had been hard but bearable because she knew that he still loved her, was always thinking of her and that this was something that he did have to do. They were intending to get back together when You-Know-Who was defeated but now…now the Law was in place and both were promised to another.

She'd been avoiding Harry although he had tried to talk to her a few times. It wasn't an easy task – they were living together, in the same house, in the same pretty small house. She couldn't talk to him though. She wasn't strong enough to talk to him. If she actually spoke to him, she would give in and cry and scream and rage. It would be humiliating and pointless. Better that Harry did not know anything, did not know that she still loved him, still yearned to be Mrs Harry Potter. Ginny Potter, it fit better, much better. It sounded better as well.

As a kid, she'd actually dreamed about marrying Harry. This was probably before she'd even met him. Her dad had told her, quite kindly, that it was fairly unlikely she would actually marry Harry (he had added, however, that Harry would be a fool not to fall in love with her). She'd been such an idiot around him, embarrassed herself countless times and then she'd finally gotten him. He'd actually loved her. Her, Ginny Weasley!

She wanted to cry, really cry. She hadn't cried for a long time, not since…well, since Hogwarts when they had been in the Room of Requirement and Harry hadn't been there and the world looked bleak, so bleak. Many people had cried when the Battle was finally over, they'd collapsed into tears of relief and joy and grief, but not her. She'd stayed strong and hadn't shed a single tear.

She stood up and eyed herself critically in the mirror. Although she and Lee weren't having a proper wedding, she still was wearing a dress. She hadn't planned to, she was just going to wear jeans but her mum had practically thrown a fit about it. She'd had to buy a dress. It was perfectly nice, nothing special.

That pretty much summed up their whole wedding, their whole relationship – nothing special. For it was not special in any way, they were more like brother and sister, indeed for years Lee had been the twin's best friend and had seen her like a little sister. It was a little awkward between them, better when they were playing Quidditch or talking about things that were not related to the wedding, marriage, love or children. It wasn't special though, it wasn't the ultimate romance she had secretly hoped for.

They had decided not to have a big, fancy wedding, agreeing that those sorts of weddings were not appropriate for them and their circumstances.

Today, she and Lee would go along to the Ministry registry offices and say their vows and sign something. Her entire family (including all of those who were Weasleys, but didn't actually bear the surname) would all traipse along; his parents might turn up as well. Then, they would be married. Her mum was cooking a big dinner (same as usual, really) and that would be that.

She tried not to think about afterwards. When she would be Lee's wife, the contract would be signed and she'd be…well, attracted to him. She couldn't think of that, it was too weird.

Suddenly, there was a very light knock at the door interrupting her musings.

"Come in." She called turning to the door.

Harry. Merlin, just the person she hadn't wanted to see.

"Hey." He said simply, sitting on her bed uninvited.

She briefly considered telling him to leave or leaving herself. She realised suddenly that she needed to talk to him, she needed closure.

"Hi."

"You look really nice." He told her awkwardly. His hands were twisting uncomfortably in his lap. She sat down next to him hesitantly; he shot her a very quick, grateful smile.

"Thanks. It's nothing special though."

There was a long, yawning, screaming silence which neither was able to break although both of them wanted to.

Ginny opened her mouth, Harry stopped her. "I know." He said plainly.

She knew he was telling the truth. He did know exactly what she was feeling and what she would have said because well, he was going to say it himself, he was feeling the same as her. It made her want to squeal with excitement and then burst into tears to know that he still loved her. She was pleased because he was supposed to love her, it was only right that he loved her. But, they would never be together, could not be together. It made her want to weep for what could have been, what would have been.

They would have been together for a few years, just seeing each other, taking it slow. They would have forever, why rush things? Then, he would propose. Properly – down on one knee, maybe in front of her family, maybe just the two of them. She would say yes, of course. They would have a small wedding, just close friends and family. Then, they would live together in a little cottage somewhere, blissfully happy. She would play Quidditch professionally and he would be an Auror, of course. One day, she would have a sort of hunch, she'd take a test and she'd have to tell him – she was pregnant. They'd have a few kids, three or four. The kids would grow up, resemble both of them, of course. They'd go off to Hogwarts, one by one. She'd be sad but so proud of them all. They'd go on to have their own families, her and Harry staying together through it all. Very in love, very happy, together always.

She blinked back tears. It was what she had wanted. She would never know this life apart from in her imaginings.

"S'okay." He mumbled taking her hand and squeezing it gently. "I know."

She managed to nod.

"You know we don't have a choice, right?"

She nodded again.

"I asked, you know. I went to Kingsley and asked him if he would change. Apparently they can't even make an exception for the Chosen One." He chuckled mournfully, more because he felt he should than through actual humour.

She smiled weakly. "S'okay, it won't be that bad."

"It'll be hard watching you marry him." He said earnestly, looking deep into her eyes. It made her want to cry all over again. "Because…I want to be the one you're marrying."

"Me too." She said thickly through tears.

"We have to though. It's gonna be okay. Promise. We'll still be friends. In then end it's supposed to fade away, everyone says that eventually you stop loving someone you can't be with. Well, I promise you it won't. I'll always love you."

"Forever." She agreed solemnly.

He pulled her to her feet and gently wiped the tears away with his thumb. Then, unexpectedly, he kissed her. She responded instantly, pulling herself closer to him, closing the non-existent gap between them. His arms were wrapped tightly around her, almost but not quite too tight. They broke away when the need for air became too great and remained in each other's arms.

"Love you." He told her, leaning his forehead against her own. It felt right. So right. This was how it was supposed to be, this was how it was supposed to feel, this was what should have been.

"Love you too." She said. Tears stung her eyes.

He removed his arms from around her, smiled at her sadly and walked out.

The door closed quietly behind him, too quietly. She wanted a loud noise, something noisy and violent, something that properly conveyed how she was feeling. They were never going to be together again – why should it be so quiet? She crumpled onto her bed and sobbed freely. She didn't care what she looked like or who would hear her or that she was supposed to be married in just under an hour. It didn't matter – her heart was broken.

Harry leaned heavily against the doorframe just listening to her sobs. He closed his eyes tightly shut and took a deep, shaky breath. He wanted to dash in their and take her in his arms and promise to be with her always, tell her they would find a way. He didn't. One tear ran down his cheek. That was all he would allow himself. He could not fall to pieces today of all days. Today, he had to be strong for her, for Ginny, for the love of his life. He had to ignore the pain, just smile as she married someone else against her will. He had to ignore the fact that his heart was broken.


	26. Harry and Lavender 3

**A/N: A Harry and Lavender chapter for ****angel15623 and Nikki Diamond.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own any part of Harry Potter.**

Harry x Lavender  
Muggle Restaurant

This was utterly humiliating. It was easily the single worst moment in her life. She'd been stood up. Stood up! The day had been going so well as well...

Harry had owl-ed her with lunch arrangements the morning after the Weasley dinner. It had been a very short letter, pretty simple and straightforward. It was Harry's style though; he'd never be the gushing type.

She'd agreed to all of the details (obviously – she was hardly in a position to decline or fuss over arrangements) and then spent the morning getting ready.

She had even booked a hair appointment and had her hair cut and reshaped especially. She'd worn a new dress (bought, technically, with Harry's money – the whole joint account thing was her favourite part of the marriage so far, even above the fame aspect). She looked good, she knew she did. Parvati was off on her honeymoon but Cho had approved her outfit for her.

The restaurant Harry had proposed was located in London, a fairly quiet and classy Muggle establishment. She'd never been before – tending to frequent wizarding eateries instead but had been impressed upon arrival. Harry hadn't arrived yet so she'd sat at the bar, ordered herself a drink and taken the opportunity to look about.

The restaurant was divided into two distinct areas: the bar area which was composed mainly of shiny chrome, dark expensive leather and lots of polished wood, and the dining area which was separated into lots of small, discreet booths. There was again lots of leather but the lighting was softer and tasteful arrangements of flowers adorned the tables. The walls were punctuated with various pictures and posters – black and white photographs of old Muggle celebrities, a few modern snaps of London, some old fashioned posters advertising all kinds of obscure items and the occasional floral scene.

It was perfect, she decided. The sort of place she liked, tasteful and luxurious with a pleasant atmosphere. It was a little off the beaten track for her though. She wouldn't end up in the papers eating here.

She'd been disappointed to find nothing about her in recent papers, although Hermione Granger had made a few appearances – mostly appearing the worse for wear, evidently inebriated and supported by various members of the Weasley family. She wondered what had happened to the quiet, studious Hermione she had known, the Hermione who had tried to steal her man from her whilst hiding behind a calm, bookworm exterior…Well, at least everyone now knew how awful the girl was, disgracing herself like that in public! No class, no taste, no decency.

She'd been a little angry when Harry had been ten minutes late. She liked punctuality and had thought that Harry would at least have the decency to be on time. Maybe he was just held up though; it wasn't like ten minutes was very much.

She'd spent a long time people watching, a favourite pastime of hers. She'd watched with delight as a couple out for lunch had had a huge row culminating in the woman storming out furiously. She'd listened as two women out for lunch had discussed an affair one of them had had with the office boss. She'd stifled a smirk as two businessmen thrashed out a business deal which clearly favoured one of the two men.

Eventually, after half an hour, the head waitress had approached her and asked her if she wanted to get a table.

It turned out that Harry had actually reserved a table for them in a cosy booth away from the main body of the dining area. She took her seat, pleased with Harry's foresight, and prepared herself for his arrival. After all, he wouldn't be much longer. He'd booked the table obviously intending to come along.

She drew a small compact mirror from her bag and discreetly checked her make up, ensuring her lipstick hadn't smudged and that her curls were perfect. (They were.)

She ordered a bottle of water and two glasses from the earnest waiter with oversized spectacles who had come to serve her. She poured herself half a glassful and sipped it slowly.

She checked out the extensive menu and decided what she wanted to eat – chicken Caesar salad, light and simple but still large enough that she didn't look like she was dieting or something. Men didn't like that; they always preferred women that actually ate a proper meal.

She went to the bathroom. The toilets were sumptuous; it was like walking into some sort of boudoir. There was even pink silk on the walls. She was impressed. She wanted a bathroom like this when she lived with Harry.

She checked the time repeatedly, sure that he couldn't possibly be much later. He was coming, she knew he was. He wouldn't not show, he'd seemed really keen to actually make an effort. Leaving her here alone would damage their relationship further and Harry wouldn't want to take that risk. He was a gentleman; after all, he would never be that callous.

She ignored the amused looks from the staff who were whispering to each other and kept shooting her sympathetic glances (the women) and chuckling (the men).

After an hour of waiting, she allowed herself to consider the remote possibility that Harry wasn't going to show. He'd left her here. Alone, to face the humiliation of being stood up in a public place, never once in all her years had something as awful as this happened to her. She was embarrassed, really embarrassed and so angry. How dare he? How could he leave her here alone, fielding snide glances from the waiters? How could he force her to walk out of here alone?

If she left now, everyone would know that she had been stood up. That would be unbearable. She could order. Although, then she would have to eat a meal alone. Merlin, both options were unthinkable.

Maybe if she just left immediately and very quickly no one would notice. She'd paid for her drink on arrival; she didn't need to wait for the cheque or anything. She could just go.

She rose to her feet and scooped up her coat and bag in one fluid motion. Then, at a half run she left the restaurant, cheeks flaming red. She kept her head ducked so she couldn't see the curious glances she was receiving.

Lavender made her way to a back alley, out of sight of any Muggles, littered with rotting cardboard boxes and half eaten food and Apparated to her flat, close to tears.

She fumbled with her keys for a long minute, unable to see clearly to fit the key in the lock and her hands shaking too much to wipe her eyes. Finally, once inside, she locked it behind her and leaned against the door.

Her legs gave way and she slid down the door, landing in a crumpled heap against the doorframe. Fat tears ran down her cheeks. She, Lavender Brown, had been stood up.

She'd never felt such utter humiliation in her life. This was worse that when she had been dumped by Ron. This was worse than when Parvati had told everyone that she fancied Seamus in third year (she had and he had later asked her to the Yule Ball, but that was beside the point and anyway, everyone knew that Seamus and Parvati were the real couple). This was worse that the time some idiotic Hufflepuff boys had charmed her skirt so it shortened itself every hour, on the hour – it had been six hours before she had noticed and managed to find a counter curse and an awful lot of people had seen a lot more than she had bargained for.

This was worse than all of that. She had been stood up in a public place, left to be laughed at by all those people, humiliated by Harry. Harry was the cause of this. She had a good mind to go and tell him exactly what she thought of him. Actually, that was exactly what she was going to do.

She stood up, wiped her eyes with the back of her hand, abandoning all sense of decorum in one swift move, and Apparated to the gate of The Burrow.

She marched up the path like a woman possessed and reached up to knock at the door. Ron opened it before she could, he looked mildly hopeful before catching sight of her.

"Oh, it's you." He said rather rudely.

"Is Harry here?" She asked coolly.

Ron stared at her for a long moment and then sighed and opened the door wider. "You'd better come in."

Unwillingly she stepped over the threshold and followed him into the living room. Every member of the family sat on the sofas, various chairs or on the floor, they were all wearing odd expressions – a peculiar mixture of anger, bewilderment and…a concealed happiness. Something had happened.

"What's-" She began.

"They've gone." Arthur said quietly.

"Who has? Gone where?" She had a nasty inkling that she knew exactly what had happened.

"Harry and Ginny have run away together. Yesterday. We don't know where they are." Ron told her.

"Oh gosh." Damn – she had been right. Well, this was bad news, terrible news, in fact. What would happen now? She couldn't marry Harry if he was in hiding and chances were, the Ministry would not be able to find him but, who would she be forced to marry now?

"The Ministry have found out. Ginny missed her wedding." Molly interjected suddenly, "They're sending people out to find them. They say the rules cannot be broken."

"They won't find them. Harry knows how to stay hidden." Hermione stated confidently.

"Best of luck to 'em, I say." Fred or George said merrily. "The Law split them up and everyone knew they were meant to be together. Even Lee was happy for them, he said he didn't care, he knew that him and Gin were never meant to be."

"Officially, I am supposed to be cross." Arthur said with a bemused smile, "But, I think they have done exactly the right thing. I hope they never get found."

And with that, the whole Weasley family were grinning and laughing and chatting merrily, Lavender abandoned at the doorway. They didn't seem bothered about her at all. They'd got what they wanted – their youngest daughter had managed to snag the most famous wizard of all time, they didn't care that she had been rejected and humiliated.

She turned and left, no one noticed. She stood for a long moment on the path, unsure of her next move. What would she do now?

**A/N: Please don't hate me – I began writing the previous chapter fully intending to have Ginny marry Lee but then as I was writing it, I knew that I just couldn't separate Harry and Ginny.**

**So, will the Ministry find them? What will Lavender do? Will Harry and Ginny marry?**

**Only one way to find out (paha, I sound like Harry Hill!) – REQUEST, a Ginny/Lee or Harry/Lavender and find out!**


	27. Blaise and Hermione 3

**A/N: A Blaise and Hermione for Nikki Diamond and LDSJediMaster and Bergere and Elfsquire90 and HopeInHell and dracosbaby08 and grangergal10. Gosh, that is a lot of people!**

**Disclaimer: I am so bored of these now, I never will own Harry Potter. Okay?**

Blaise x Hermione  
The Burrow

She'd built up to this moment, planned it well. She'd come into Hermione's room (for it was no longer Ginny's seeing as how her youngest child was now pretty much a fugitive) on the pretence of sorting laundry. "Hermione…" Molly began hesitantly.

Hermione looked up from her Muggle book absent mindedly. Molly waited patiently whilst Hermione placed the bookmark almost reverently inside her book, closed it and laid it to one side.

Finally satisfied she had her full attention, Molly continued, "I was thinking…this whole…partying to annoy the Zabini's…well, don't you think it's gone a bit….far?"

"No."

"C'mon Hermione, dear, you've been out three times this week and been in the papers every time. Would you ever do anything like that if it wasn't for him? Of course you wouldn't. You're not like that."

"I can be like that if I want to." Hermione said stubbornly.

"But it's not you." Molly said loudly, "You've never been that sort of girl and to be frank…it doesn't suit you."

"You were all for it the first time."

"Yeah, but that was when it was just a bit of fun, a kick in the teeth for the Zabini's and that was that. I thought it was a one off. And it's turned into some sort of habit."

"It's not a habit!" Hermione denied hotly, "I'm doing it because I want to."

"No you're not; you're doing it because you want to annoy Blaise and his mother. I mean, look at you, you're not used to all the drink, are you?"

"No." Hermione admitted grudgingly.

"You need to stop, Hermione. It's gone far enough now." Molly said firmly. "You need to stop."

Hermione turned away childishly and picked her book up. Molly watched her for a long moment, perfectly aware that she was not reading a single word, sighed loudly and then, taking the hint, left.

Hermione put the book down the second Molly left the room. Reading could help her with most things but this, this she couldn't read about in a book or solve by escaping into a different world. These feelings were real, too real for words.

She was scared. So scared. She was alone now. Ginny had gone, escaped with Harry. At least Ginny had a way out of her marriage, at least she had someone who loved her and was willing to break the law for her, at least she hadn't got to marry someone she hated.

She and Ginny had spent hours talking into the night, confiding their fears, discussing their upcoming nuptials frankly and honestly. They'd been a source of comfort to the other, someone they knew they could always turn to. But now, now Ginny had gone, left her, left her alone. So alone. She couldn't talk to anyone about her feelings, no one would understand. She might have confided in Harry, he would have been nice at least, but he was gone too – gone with Ginny.

Thinking about it critically her mass of problems only really were two issues – Ginny and Harry were gone and she was to marry Blaise Zabini.

Ginny and Harry were two of the people she loved most in the whole entire world. That they had gone caused her mixed emotions – she was happy for them because they were meant to be together, she was secretly pleased they had the courage and the guts to defy the Ministry, but she was upset they had gone, hurt they hadn't told her that they were even going and so very scared that they would be caught and punished.

The Minister was openly furious about their blatant law-breaking – she understood his dilemma though, on the one hand Harry Potter was the Boy-Who-Lived, the Chosen One, the Saviour of the wizarding world and a friend, he didn't want to find Harry and Ginny and force them to marry their intended spouses, indeed the whole wizarding world had leapt eagerly on the story. They loved the romance, the danger, the heartbreak of the story. However, Hermione understood that Kingsley could not condone this sort of behaviour. He had obviously reinstated this unpopular law for a reason and their defiance was undermining everything he was working for.

Her other problem was slightly more pressing; she had to marry Blaise Zabini - Slytherin, possible Voldemort supporter and anti-Muggleborn. She didn't like him, loathed him in fact, hated his harpy of a mother and could find absolutely no way to get out of the upcoming marriage.

She was avoiding Blaise as much as possible, going out every night with the sole purpose of being photographed in a compromising situation and then stumbling home in eager anticipation of Blaise's angry letters the next morning. He'd actually sent her a Howler the other day, she had been thrilled – point to Hermione.

However, the downsides of this action were considerable. Firstly, she was getting a reputation. Countless articles said nasty things about her, some eminent psychologist had tried to pin what had happened with Voldemort on what she was doing now, journalists were having a field day. She was the new good girl gone bad, the fallen of the Golden Trio, she was big news. And she hated every minute of it. Her only consolation was that the people she cared about knew the truth and that her parents did not get wizarding papers or magazines.

The second problem was that she really could not handle her drink. She eyed herself critically in the mirror – her hair was lank, her skin was pale, she looked gaunt, worryingly so, thick dark circles underlined her eyes. She looked awful. Really awful. Molly was right – she was not used to this sort of thing. Late nights, lots of alcohol and too much partying was not for her, she didn't enjoy it; she usually went home as soon as she'd been photographed a few times.

The Weasley family were growing tired of her antics, that much was clear. They thought it was a tired act now and that she needed to stop and slow down. They wanted the old Hermione back. Hell, Hermione wanted the old Hermione back.

She was already sick of this partying. The satisfaction she gained from winding up Blaise was now not enough to outweigh the other problems. She needed to stop before it was too late.

She jumped to her feet, grabbed her towel and made her way to the small bathroom (thankfully, because of the late hour it was free). Once showered, dressed in fresh, Hermione-ish clothes and with clean hair, she felt heaps better.

She made her way down to the kitchen – lunch time, Weasley style, was in full swing. Mrs Weasley presided (as usual) over the room, leaning against a counter and smiling fondly as her remaining children set upon the food like a bunch of savages. As she turned away, out of sight of the others, only Hermione saw the worry and fear that crept onto her face. Molly was scared for her only daughter and adopted son.

Hermione crossed the room to her, "They'll be okay." She said quietly making sure none of the others could hear.

She needn't have worried – the twins (and the ever present Angelina) were discussing a new product for their shop, Ron was sitting sulkily alone, she knew he was missing Harry a lot, he was also upset that Harry hadn't confided in him, Arthur had taken his lunch out into his shed, he spent a lot of time their these days escaping from the constant noise and mayhem inside the house, Percy hadn't come home for lunch, Bill had turned up unexpectedly with a very pregnant and disgruntled Fleur and they were talking together happily, fingers interlinked. Bill and Fleur hadn't been around for a few weeks, Fleur hated being pregnant and absolutely loathed anyone seeing her pregnant.

"I know." Molly murmured back, "But I can't help but worry."

"Me neither." There was a long pause and then Hermione said softly, "Thanks for what you said. And…you're right."

Molly smiled sadly at her. "I know, love. Things'll work out. They always do."

Hermione nodded. She didn't agree – nothing was going to work out, things were all wrong for her, so very wrong.

**A/N: I was bored of such an OOC Hermione, she isn't the type to go out and get trashed and I hope I explained how she did it and why she realised she should stop.**

**Next chapter, I think should be something that talks about HarryxGinny. Might not actually directly talk about them – possibly Lee's POV on the events, but if enough people want it then I will do one of Harry and Ginny and where they are now.**

**Please keep reviewing – and if you have reviewed, I love you. Seriously.**

**Ooh, another thing - some people can't access some of my chapters. I have no idea why or how I can make them magically reappear. Anyone know what's happening there?**


	28. Harry and Ginny 1

**A/N: As requsted by (I've also included anyone who requested HarryxLavender or LeexGinny in this - I suspect they all really wanted Harry and Ginny, if you want something in Lavender or Lee's POV then request it!) Bergere, tamara72, Dumbledore's Mum, Nikki Diamond, grangergal101, Whisperheart, Carrotcucumber and Padfoot-Moony-an-Prongs.**

**Disclaimer: I still do not own Harry or Ginny or any part of Harry Potter. Sad, but true.**

Harry x Ginny  
Norfolk

He told himself firmly, for the fifth time, to walk away from her door and to go downstairs and act like nothing was wrong. He ignored himself yet again. He couldn't do it, he couldn't walk away from her, from everything he had ever wanted. Lee Jordan didn't deserve her, him and Ginny weren't supposed to be together. Ginny was his, would always be his. He cut this line of thought off, realising that these thoughts were not allowed, not anymore. She was about to become Lee's wife. He, Harry, would be married to Lavender and right now, he had to walk away. He had to get far away from her room before someone saw him there or she came out or something.

He took a deep breath, turned on his heel firmly and took a step forward. Another. His heart shattered a little more with each step. A third slow step.

Suddenly, Ron was in front of him. He realised that he shouldn't be here and that he needed to find an excuse, fast.

Ron stopped him, "Harry, you're doing the wrong thing. Go back. You and her should be together, everyone knows it."

Harry was entirely bewildered - was Ron...telling him to go back to Ginny?

"Go back, Harry. And for god's sake, look after her."

"Thanks mate." Harry said fervently.

Ron hugged him quickly and then gave him an abrupt shove towards Ginny's door.

He flung her door open, turned back to nod at Ron (who smiled and then walked away), Ginny was sat crumpled on her bed sobbing freely.

He gathered her into his arms and kissed her again, kissed away the tears on her cheeks.

Then, his mind was made up. "Let's be together."

He half regretted the words the second they were out; he almost, but not quite, wanted to take them back. There was a long silence and he was so close to saying it was a stupid idea and to forget it all, but suddenly she smiled. He forgot instantly what he was about to say, she was smiling, she was happy, it was all okay.

"Okay. Let's do it."

Oh - he hadn't actually expected her to say yes, (although he was thrilled that she had) he had no idea where they were going to go or what they would do. He knew that this was a very stupid move and that they would regret it later but he didn't care. He had to be with her, they were meant to be together, it was only right that they would be.

He took her hand in his, "Are you sure? It'll be hard." He told her seriously. He felt a weird responsibility to tell her the truth, a smaller, less noble part of him shouted at him to get a move on and leave already. "You won't be able to see your family for a while. Maybe not ever again. We'll have to camp out, live in other people's houses for a bit. Sometimes we might not have enough to eat; we might run out of money, Gin. Don't do this unless you're sure."

"I don't care. All I need is you. I've never been more sure about anything in my whole life." She told him hurriedly meaning every single word of it. It was true – he was the most important thing to her, the most important ever, and if she had him, she didn't need anything else. Lavender had wanted not just Harry but his money and a lavish lifestyle to boot, she, Ginny, didn't need anything else. She would sleep rough and eat scraps for the rest of her life as long as he was there alongside her.

He kissed her again fervently. "Let's go then."

He took her hand and Apparated away from The Burrow, away from the Weasley's, away from the only family they had. It was tough, a difficult thing to do, more difficult than either of them had thought it would be.

He wanted to tell the rest of the Weasleys first and Hermione, but he knew he couldn't. They would persuade them not to, would be forced to tell on them if they were questioned with Verituserum, they would then hold the incriminating knowledge. Better for all of them if no one knew, better if they just got away now, better that they stayed away for the time being.

When they finally landed at their destination, they both looked around curiously. They were standing in a newly ploughed field, mud was already sticking to their shoes. Ginny remembered suddenly that she was still wearing an impractical dress and nice shoes, completely inappropriate for the countryside. Next to the field, were a small semi circle of semi-detached houses all centred around a neatly mown circle of grass. A single track road rang alongside it and disappeared into the distance in both directions.

"Norfolk." He told her simply, "The Dursleys went to Norfolk once on holiday. Didn't take me, of course, I always wanted to go though. And also, it's pretty far away from London. We need to stay hidden for a while."

"What on earth have we done?" Ginny whispered suddenly, paling visibly and looking horror struck. "What have we done?"

Harry pulled him to her quickly and looked directly into her eyes, "S'okay. We're meant to be together, Gin, you know that." She nodded – he was right, they were absolutely meant to be together, destined some would say. "We're just doing what we're supposed to do. It'll be hard, but we'll be together."

She nodded again, a little colour beginning to creep onto her cheeks again.

"D'you want to go back?" He asked her quietly. "I don't mind if you do. I'm asking a lot, I know that. You can go back anytime, whenever you want, I won't say a word. Promise." He was regretting his actions already – she didn't want this, he'd done the wrong thing, who would want this? She wanted a good life and right now, he couldn't give her that. She probably wanted to go home, to be with her family, to marry her sort-of-alright fiancée. He didn't blame her.

"It'll be easier if I go back," She began and Harry's heart sunk, "But I can't, Harry. I love you, not him. I want to be with you, be your wife. I can do anything as long as I'm with you."

He grinned at her, "So… fancy exploring a bit?"

They crossed the field and stepped onto the tarmac road. "Which way now?" She said.

"Right." Harry said decisively, "There are houses and stuff there."

They walked left, hand in hand, past the houses and down past a row of a few more similar houses all with identical square front gardens.

At the end of the road was a T-junction and sign post.

"Rockland All Saints." Ginny read, "Never heard of it."

"Me neither." Harry laughed. "But that's good; if we haven't then chances are no one else has."

Within two minutes they had reached the village centre. It was clearly a tiny, rural village – it had a pub, a little shop, a primary school and not much else. Ginny loved it instantly. She liked the country charm, the utter lack of people there, the sleepy, laid back feel. She had always wanted to live somewhere very like this.

They went into the shop. It's tiny size was misleading, inside was stocked everything anyone could possibly want – pots of yogurt, sweets and chocolate, a whole rack of ladies tights, tinned custard, packets of sausages, newspapers, a frozen cheesecake, birthday cards, note paper, tins of soup, a small selection of fruit and vegetables, pints of milk, tubs of hair gel and glossy magazines. The shop was hectically cluttered, items lining every shelf and stacked in heaps upon the floor.

The shop keeper, a thin, balding man wearing a green polo shirt with "The Spar" embroidered onto it smiled helpfully from behind the counter. "Hello, haven't seen you around. Are you new here?"

"Urm… not exactly. We're just visiting." Ginny explained.

"Yeah." Harry inserted pointlessly.

"Well, if you need any help let me know."

"It'll be all over the village that we've been here." Ginny whispered to Harry when they were out of earshot. She giggled, "So much for secrecy. We'd be better off in a city or something."

"But this is a non magical place. We're safe here. No one would ever suspect a thing. We could get a little house somewhere near here, get married, live here in obscurity."

It did sound idyllic, Ginny conceded, but it wasn't very practical. They had no money at the moment, the whole of the Ministry were probably hunting for them and they had nowhere to go. Although, she did rather like the second idea he had had – becoming Ginny Potter was definitely on her to do list.

She turned back to the overly helpful shopkeeper (noticing a name tag also pinned to his top, his name was Alan). "Is there anywhere we can stay around here?"

"Follow this road up to the playing field and there's a bed and breakfast."

"Sounds perfect, thanks for your help." She smiled at him, waved and tugged Harry out of the compact shop and back into the deserted street. "Let's just spend the night there and decide what to do in the morning."

Harry had his own ideas about what he wanted to do in the morning – he wanted to make Ginny his wife. He'd been mulling it over since he'd taken her up here and he'd come to this decision. If Ginny was legally Mrs Potter, then the Ministry could do nothing about it, divorce was not a wizarding concept. They could be together forever; husband and wife and no one would be able to do anything about it. Their friends and family would welcome them in, the wizarding world would probably be delighted and they would be together.

Mrs Ginny Potter, it had a ring to it, he decided.

As they walked up the street, Ginny was wondering when Harry was going to marry her. After all, surely being married was the only way they could stay together.

Mrs Ginny Potter, probably her favourite name in the whole world, she decided.

**Author's Note: Anyone ever heard of Rocklands? Well, it just happens to be where I live, complete with Alan – the lovely but slightly over helpful shop owner. Oh yes, he is real and my village is really like that – everyone knows everyone.**

**So, satisfy your Harry and Ginny requests? Let me know!**

**Also, people have started requesting other things that aren't strictly a couple – well, I've decided I quite like these ideas. So, if you want to see something that isn't one of my couplings, for example Molly's POV on something or a bit talking about Kingsley, then just let me know and I'll see what I can do.**


	29. Molly Speaks

**A/N: For Lexxxx who wanted to see what Molly had to say. **

**Keep requesting!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own any part, or whole, of Harry Potter.**

Molly Speaks  
The Burrow

She'd said all along something like this would happen. She'd been right as well. She did like to be right but sometimes, sometimes it would be so much easier if she could just be wrong about something.

It was selfish of them both really to run off together. Yes, as a mother she was happy her daughter was both spirited and loved by a good man. Yes, she had always wanted Ginny and Harry to be together and yes, she did hope the Ministry didn't find them. But it wasn't about that, it was the principle of the matter.

They shouldn't have done it. They were promised to other people. They'd let them both down – although neither of them seemed bothered like they should be. On the contrary, Lee was thrilled. The twins were speaking to him again, he could still be part of the family but the right way this time and anyway, it wasn't like him and Ginny had been romantically involved so to speak. Maybe Ginny had done the right thing. But Harry on the other hand, Harry was supposed to be a gentleman. That poor Lavender girl, she'd been distraught. Although, less about Harry actually not being there more about what people would say and what her new 'status' would be. Molly didn't like her. Lavender was everything Molly hated in a girl – self centred, spoiled, lazy, unfriendly, hostile, cold….she wasn't a good person for Harry. Perhaps Lavender might have deserved it…

She set her empty mug of tea down onto the table and decided quite firmly that she had run out of excuses and could stop arguing with herself now – she was over the moon Harry and Ginny had run away together. She only hoped they had the foresight to get married before the came back. Divorce was not a wizarding concept, it was practically taboo. Divorce was for Muggles, something they did when they hated each other. Wizards and witches stuck it out. If they were married, well… they could be together forever; no one would be able to force them apart. They could be happy.

She was a little disappointed she couldn't be there to see Harry and Ginny get married. Now that was a wedding she would have loved… Ginny and Lee weren't having a wedding, she'd been a little relieved. Weddings were for people who were in love, they had not been in love and it would have been an uncomfortable situation for all involved. But Harry and Ginny, they were very much in love and they'd proved it several times over, they would have had a beautiful wedding. Maybe when Ginny returned she, Molly, would be able to persuade her into having a wedding to renew the vows or something. Ginny would probably say no, Molly would have to use the 'you're my only daughter' card. It was a low blow but being a mother had made her clever – sometimes you had to use the guilt card to get what you wanted.

She was scared though. The Ministry were cracking down hard on any rebels (a young man in the south of the country had just been put in Azkaban for organising anti-marriage law rallies) and Harry and Ginny had done worse than that. They'd turned the whole Ministry on its head, they'd made a mockery of the law and the tough new stance. They'd all but jumped up and down on the new law and had the guts to laugh as they did so. The Ministry had sent hundreds of Aurors out after them – although, it did rather help that the Weasleys were personal friends with a large number of them and that actually Harry was a role model, a hero, someone to look up to for the large majority. She knew that many of them were not really looking for the young couple. Maybe they would not be found. She found herself praying to whatever was out there that they would not be found. They couldn't be found. Her daughter and her adopted son…they deserved a chance. They had both seen awful things, things that no person should have to seen, let alone young teenagers, they'd shown enormous courage, saved the Ministry's miserable…and all they could do was wreck this whole generation's lives. What a way to repay them all.

She was, on the whole, entirely divided over her children's spouses. Fred seemed to be very happy with Angelina, Angie was a nice girl. Molly wouldn't mind having her as a daughter-in-law. And Luna, Luna and George were good together. She'd seen their relationship progress from George's mocking her left, right and centre, to discreet glances over the dinner table to sneaking out to meet up. Oh they thought she did not know, but she was a mother she knew right from the very start. They couldn't fool her. Luna needed some mothering and if Molly became her mother-in-law, well…it would all work out nicely.

That Cho girl, however, was a nasty piece of work. Percy deserved better, Percy was haunted by horrible dreams of the war, he deserved love. He wasn't going to find love with that girl. She was unfriendly, looked down on the Weasleys and made no effort to fit in. Molly could have put up with all of this if Percy had actually chosen Cho. But he hadn't. And so, Molly hoped that Cho wouldn't find the need to visit often. She was a little embarrassed by her own thoughts. After all, Cho would be family. Molly was supposed to love all of her own family, regardless of what they did, but somehow she just could not warm to Cho. She didn't think anyone would blame her, Cho wasn't nice to anyone.

Ron, her youngest son, seemed okay with Padma too. He'd been rude at the beginning, unaccountably rude; Molly had been a little ashamed of him. He'd pulled it together eventually though; he'd talked to her and been nice. Padma had been to dinner a few times before. Molly quite liked her; she was intelligent, a little like Hermione only less bookish. Molly had harboured hopes that Hermione and Ron would marry although she realised now that this was impossible. After all, they didn't seem to even want to take it any further than just friendship. Ah well, you win some, you lose some, she told herself. Hermione would always be a part of the family, whether she bore the surname or not.

Neville and Hannah were a perfect pair, bless them. They were still shy around each other, overwhelmed by their feelings but she knew that deep down, they were very much in love and would be very happy together. She was pleased for them, they were such lovely kids. They deserved happiness.

Hermione was a different matter altogether. Poor girl – matched with a Zabini, no less. She knew that Hermione felt very alone and very scared and felt like everything was wrong, but it would all be okay in the end. She felt like she should help Hermione out, at least she hadn't gone too far down the drinking route. She'd had a word with her about that and Hermione had listened and stopped. That was a start. Hermione needed help though, ordinarily Ginny would have been the shoulder to cry on, and then perhaps Harry, if Ginny had not been around, but they were gone. Ron was Hermione's next best friend, but Molly knew more than anyone how accidentally tactless her youngest son could be and how much he, himself, was struggling with the departure of his best friend. Perhaps, Padma could help there, they could be good friends. Padma wasn't that friendly with the Cho girl or Lavender, thank Merlin. Padma would be a good friend to Hermione.

The kitchen door opened unexpectedly and Molly's hand flew to her wand – a habit born of the war, unnecessary now but still a reflex for them all.

"Hey, it's just me." Arthur grinned. Her Arthur, she was glad he was home for lunch. Not many of them were in for lunch now and she got lonely.

"Arthur." She smiled back, hugging him.

"Anyone in?"

"No, just me. Want a cuppa?"

"Go on then. Any chance of lunch?" He shot her a hopeful look.

She swatted at him playfully with her striped tea towel, "If you're lucky. Sit down. How was work?"

She busied herself with the kettle and then making sandwiches as Arthur told her about some nightmare at work involving a cauldron that was bewitched to dance randomly and then spurt boiling water at passersby. She laughed dutifully, not really concentrating on his words, still worrying about her family.

"They'll be okay, you know." Arthur said suddenly, cutting through her reverie.

"Who will?" She said, pretending she didn't know who he was talking about.

"They all will be, you don't have to worry about them. They'll all work it out." He smiled tiredly, "It'll be okay, Moll."

She nodded, "I hope so, Arthur. I can't bear for them to be so unhappy. Don't you think that they deserve to find true love? They've seen so much, too much. They need to be able to flirt and tease and court without any obligations for a while and then what they need is love." She cried out, unwittingly releasing a small part of her inner burden of worry.

"They do deserve love." Arthur agreed, "And let's pray to Merlin that at least some of them find it."

She nodded grimly and turned back to the awaiting food. He was right – she could keep worrying, there was nothing she could do; perhaps this would be good for some of them. Maybe this could be a good thing.

**A/N: Love it? Hate it? Think I've got it all wrong? Let me know - press the Review button!**


	30. Ron and Padma 3

**A/N: A RonxPadma chapter for NikkiDiamond, LDSJediMaster and Pilks. **

**Please keep requesting – I promise to get round to them all! Possibly going to write a wedding next, I'm a bit bored of writing Weasley dinners and such. I think it is time for the story to move on a bit, see some married life!**

**Disclaimer: Harry Potter – I still do not own it. **

Ron x Padma  
The Burrow

She honestly could not understand why some of her friends (or rather, her sister's friends – she didn't really like them that much, too shallow, too silly, too vain) didn't like it here. The Burrow was fast becoming one of her favourite places in the entire world. This was only the third time she had visited but she found herself feeling like she fit in.

She knew where things were. She knew exactly which cupboard the plates were in. She knew that actually you did have to all but run to the food when it was served otherwise it would all have gone by the time you got there. She knew everybody's names, she'd even picked up a few of the stories they told often. She'd grown to like the disorganised clutter in the house, the twins' random pranks, the constant noise and chatter. She'd realised that the Weasleys didn't mean to be unwelcoming – they just got preoccupied sometimes and forgot about other people. Percy had explained that to her one day, he told her that he quite often was ignored because he was quieter than the rest and the only solution to this problem was to be very loud. He said that Ginny was particularly good at this. She sort of envied Ginny actually, all that family, all those protective, loving older brothers. Ginny just fitted in with them all – she was feminine, but still quite boyish, she knew how to cook but she could also talk Quidditch with the rest of them. Padma had decided quite early on that she wanted to fit in like Ginny did.

She walked up the garden path, nimbly dodging a stray gnome which sprinted across the path in front of her and disappeared into a clump of bushes. She let herself in – apparently, only visitors knocked. She was a visitor, but Hermione had said, she was also a friend and so she didn't need to knock. That had made her smile. She was their friend. She liked Hermione very much, she thought that Hermione and her should have spoken earlier. They had a lot in common. At Hogwarts, Padma had never taken the time to speak to her, thinking that she was a little dull. Hermione wasn't like that at all, she was lovely, kind, intelligent, interesting. Padma hoped they would become good friends.

Inside, it was as noisy as ever. She wandered into the living room, hanging her jacket up on a peg as she did so. It seemed that there were some extra people here today – she noticed the twins sat on one sofa, talking and laughing very loudly. She was prepared to bet a great deal of money on the fact that the twins had done something to someone, and judging by the covert looks they kept shooting Ron, something was going to happen to Ron pretty soon. Neville and Dean Thomas were sat on the floor, chatting away. She'd never seen Dean Thomas here before, she hadn't known that him and the Weasleys were even friends.

On the second sofa were Ron and Hermione (she noted that Hermione had seen the twins' looks and was edging as far away from Ron as she possibly could in the small space), pinning Hermione in was Harry. He was clutching a baby with hair remarkably similar to Harry's own. She spent a few seconds trying to work out if Harry had a child she didn't know about before realising that it couldn't be Harry's child. She wondered who the baby belonged to.

Fleur Decalour…Weasley now actually, Padma remembered, was sitting in the armchair. Padma vaguely remembered her from the Triwizard Tournament. She was very pregnant and looked incredibly disgruntled. However, despite this she was still heartbreakingly beautiful. Padma stifled an odd stab of jealousy. A tall red haired man, evidently a Weasley, entered the room and crouched down by Fleur. Maybe that was Bill. She'd never seen him but they talked about him a lot – apparently, he'd been a curse breaker for Gringotts. Now that was one cool job.

"Hey." Ron said suddenly, looking up and seeing her. "Alright?"

"Yeah, thanks." She answered. Suddenly, there was a loud bang and Ron turned into a large yellow canary. The whole room erupted into raucous laughter, Padma joined it. Ron squawked loudly and the feathers dropped away and vanished. The twins stood up and bowed, took one look at Ron's angry expression and then Apparated away with a cracking sound, still cackling evilly.

"That's the fourth time today that's happened." Hermione said with relish. "I wonder why they keep targeting you Ron..."

Harry grinned at her, "It's not mine by the way." He said gesturing at the gurgling baby.

"Well, I did wonder." Padma teased.

"Nah, this is my godson – Teddy Lupin. His parents were Remus Lupin and Tonks. Dunno if you knew them. They were killed in the Battle." Harry sounded very sad – Padma wondered how Harry had known them. He had obviously loved them both.

"Anyway, Ted here is an Metamorphus." Ron said proudly. "We can't ask him to change it yet because he doesn't understand but sometimes he does my hair."

"It might not be your hair." Hermione interjected, "It's just generic Weasley hair."

"I still think it's mine." Ron said stubbornly.

Harry smirked. "Well he does my hair more often." He was right – the evidence of this was right in front of him.

Ron made a face.

Padma stifled giggles, Hermione stood up. "C'mon, let's go in the kitchen. All the girls are in there."

"Kay. See you later." She said to Ron and Harry who smiled and then turned back to baby Teddy.

The kitchen was full – Hannah Abbott was perched on a chair clutching a steaming mug of tea with both hands, Molly was preparing food, as per usual, Luna and Angelina were sat on a chair each and deep in conversation, Ginny was folding laundry in a corner of the kitchen in a bad tempered fashion, muttering sulkily as she did so, in fact, the only girl missing was Fleur.

"Hello dear." Molly waved her wooden spoon in Padma's general direction.

"Hello Molly, do you need any help?"

"No, no dear. I'm fine." Padma always asked if Molly needed help, as did everyone else, and Molly always turned it down. Padma thought that Molly just liked to provide for her family by herself; it wasn't that she was ungrateful or anything, she just liked to do it herself.

The chatter turned to weddings and dresses. It seemed that Angelina had found 'the one' – strapless, cream, long, but wanted Molly's opinion on it. Luna said dreamily that she didn't much like traditional wedding dresses and would much prefer something colourful. Molly's eyebrows rose dramatically into her hair at this statement and Ginny burst into hastily smothered giggles. Ginny had said firmly that she wasn't wearing anything special and had a brief argument with Molly – which Molly won – before conceding that she would consent to wear a dress but it would not be white or strapless or long at all. Molly had smiled happily. Padma realised that Molly always did get her way in the end. Hannah had revealed, under careful questioning, that she was going to wear her mother's dress but that it needed taking in a little and so was at the tailors. Hermione paled visibly at the idea of dresses and no one pushed her about her own wedding.

Then, they turned to her, "What are you wearing, Padma dear?" Molly asked.

"I haven't really thought about it. I don't even know if we're having a proper traditional wedding." She replied honestly. She hadn't spoken to Ron much and never about anything wedding related. It was a subject they carefully avoided.

"Course we are." Ron's voice said loudly. He was lounging in the doorway.

"Well, that's settled then." Molly beamed merrily.

Padma just nodded.

"Mum, have you seen my Quidditch robes? You said you'd wash them and they've disappeared."

"They're in your room, Ron."

"They're not." Ron disagreed.

Hermione rolled her eyes, "You probably haven't even looked."

"I have!" Ron denied indignantly.

Harry appeared at the doorway, "He has. He's emptied all of our clothes across my bed." He wore a mock-pained expression and had baby Teddy perched on his hip.

Hermione laughed derisively, "I bet I could find them."

"Without magic?" Ron said, folding his arms across his chest.

"Yes." Hermione said firmly, she threw her wand at Ron who caught it deftly. "Come on Padma. You can make sure I don't cheat." She pulled Padma to her feet and half dragged her upstairs to Ron and Harry's room.

It was somehow untidier than the rest of the house. Clothes were strewn untidily across a camp bed, the whole room was covered in moving posters and two owls were in cages in one corner. There was a smell of boy lingering in the air. Hermione wrinkled her nose delicately, "I do hate their room."

"Can you find his robes?" Padma asked doubtfully.

"I can do wandless magic." Hermione told her, "Only basic things, of course, but not having my wand isn't a problem."

She concentrated hard for a moment and then a set of Quidditch robes rose slowly from under the pile of clothing and Hermione caught them triumphantly.

"Wow." Padma said, impressed. Wandless magic was very difficult, she couldn't do it, in fact she didn't know anyone else who could.

"It's nothing." Hermione replied modestly, "Just don't tell the boys I can do it."

Padma chuckled, "I won't."

Hermione ran downstairs and Padma heard Ron's exclamations, Harry's chuckles and the rest of the family's teasing.

Then Ron appeared in the centre of his room, "How on earth did she find them? Did she cheat?" He demanded.

"She just looked for them."

"Liar!"

"No, she really did!" Padma lied. Luckily, she was a passable liar.

Ron just laughed, "Erm… listen, you did want a proper wedding, didn't you?"

"Yes." She told him. "I really did, I would have been gutted if you didn't!"

"Thank Merlin, Mum has been telling me for weeks that I have to have a proper wedding. Erm… she wants me to ask you over tomorrow for lunch and to talk about the wedding and stuff…is that okay?"

"Sounds great." She smiled at him and he half smiled back.

"Let's go get dinner."


	31. Draco and Katie 4

**A/N: Okay, firstly I have to apologise profusely for confusing everyone in the last chapter. Harry and Ginny are not back (yet!) – Padma's chapter was intended to fill in a few moments before Harry and Ginny leave. Sorry I confused you all – I'll be more specific in the future about when each piece is supposed to have happened! And as a note, this chapter happens AFTER Harry and Ginny leave.**

**Secondly, if you fancy reading something really good – try LDSJediMaster's ****'What The World Needs Now'****. It's actually based on this fanfiction (although, from this point onwards, the two stories will feature different events) and is centred around Draco and Katie. Seriously, you should check it out!**

**Thirdly, 'Marriage, Babies and Hatred' has just become my most reviewed story – thank you so much to everyone who has reviewed (and especially those who review every chapter – you're amazing, simple as), you really do make my day.**

**Fourthly, this chapter is for Bergere, dracosbaby08, Dumbledore's Mum, Nikki Diamond and Lexxxx who all requested a Katie and Draco chapter. It is also for Pilks who wanted a wedding.**

**And lastly, keep reviewing and requesting – I have a whole list to write but I'm working my way through them and I will get around to your request eventually.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, still.**

Draco x Katie  
The Wedding

Time was up. Time had run out. Her time was over. It was too late now for any action. She could fight no more, time really had run out. Today was her wedding day. It should be the happiest day of her life. It wasn't. It really wasn't.

Why, you may ask. One reason – the groom. Usually, when two people decide to get married they are in love, they want to be married, they want to publicly make their vows, they want the whole world to know that they are husband and wife. For Katie Bell, the direct opposite was true. She loathed Draco Malfoy, her intended husband, with a cold passion. She hated every single thing about him – his arrogant manner, his icy mother, his criminal father, his opulent and cold mansion, his odd paleness, the constant smirk he wore, his Pureblood breeding. Everything. He did not posess a single redeeming quality. He was a Death Eater, for Merlin's sake. What was the Ministry thinking pairing her – Katie Bell, who fought in the Final Battle against You-Know-Who, who was the victim of a cursed necklace planted by Malfoy at Hogwarts, who had never even so much as considered the Dark Arts – with Draco Malfoy, Death Eater?

She took a deep breath and turned to the mirror before her. It was full length and ornate carvings decorated the edges. It was silver. It was a Malfoy possession. Everything in the Malfoy Mansion seemed to be silver or green. Katie had decided quite early on that these were her two least favourite colours in the world.

Narcissa had insisted that Katie get ready at the Malfoy Mansion. She had been forced to oblige, Narcissa always managed to get her own way without ever entering any sort of conflict. Katie had gotten ready with the help of her bridesmaids but now she was alone. She'd told Alicia that she just needed a few moments to compose herself, Alicia had understood completely and had ushered everyone out (even Narcissa).

Alicia was her very best friend; she didn't need to tell Alicia that she wanted to cry for while, to weep over her lost freedom, horrible husband and awful life. Alicia already knew.

Katie wished she had had the courage to actually do something. Plenty of wizards and witches were fighting, fighting for their freedom and to get out of their marriages. Some had gone into hiding; although few had managed to stay concealed. Harry and Ginny were, in fact, the only two who had not been captured by the Ministry so far. Katie thought that those two had a better chance at staying hidden than most others. A few poor souls had taken their own lives, seeing this as the only escape. Katie shuddered at the mere thought of it, she was not that desperate. She still wanted to live, no matter what Alicia thought. She had told her several times that she wasn't going to kill herself; Alicia had just smiled, nodded and hidden all of the kitchen knives.

Katie dragged her eyes away from tracing the hypnotic swirling plasterwork on the mirror and forced herself to look at her own reflection. This was her wedding day after all, she reminded herself and she still had to look the part. This would be her only chance to get married. Her only wedding.

She couldn't see her own image, her eyes were blurred with tears which fell freely and heavily, creating dark circles on her white silk dress which slowly shrunk and disappeared.

She cried for a long time, not caring how loud she was being or who might be listening or what she would look like. She needed to cry. She would not cry when she was a Malfoy, Malfoys did not cry. She would not give Draco and his mother the satisfaction of seeing her broken.

Finally, she took a shaky breath and wiped her eyes delicately with a tissue. She looked hard at the girl in the mirror. It didn't look much like her. She supposed that this girl did look rather nice, but it wasn't her, not Katie.

The girl was wearing a slim fitting, white silk dress, obviously expensive. Katie didn't wear expensive things; she didn't have the money to spare.

The girl wore high heels. Katie rarely wore heels. She couldn't even walk that well in them.

The girl had her hair piled onto her head with strands set into bouncy curls. Katie had straight hair, sometimes she would charm it to be perfectly straight.

This girl wore a full face of make up. Katie didn't wear that much make up, especially not on a day to day basis.

The girl wore a diamond bracelet. Katie didn't even own a single diamond, let alone a whole bracelet's worth.

This girl looked elegant and sophisticated and…Pureblood. Katie was Pureblood but not openly or traditionally so, Katie was a tad clumsy, Katie was pretty common, to tell the truth, and happy to be that way.

This girl was very pale, she didn't smile and she looked terrified. Katie was happy, positive, up beat, smiley. Alicia called her 'the little ray of sunshine' in her dark, morning moods whilst Katie put music on and sang and ate breakfast with great gusto.

The girl wasn't her.

Katie blinked and the girl shimmered and became her again. She looked pale and frightened. Critically, Katie frowned at her reflection. She magically removed the traces of mascara from under her eyes. She couldn't do anything about the faint dark circles under her eyes though. That was something natural at least, something that Narcissa couldn't perfect. The little imperfection made her feel just a twinge of bitter, twisted satisfaction. The circles were a result of not sleeping properly, of tossing and turning endlessly haunted by dreams of You-Know-Who and the Malfoy Mansion and Lucius Malfoy and Draco and the Final Battle.

She was scared. She was so scared. She didn't want this – she didn't want to get married. She wished again that she'd escaped, or at least tried to, while she still could. She couldn't leave now, Narcissa would undoubtedly be lurking somewhere ready to foil any escape attempts. The house was swarming with people, although the actual wedding was being held at some fancy park somewhere.

On an impulse, she walked slowly over to the leaded window and watched as Draco, surrounded by a few friends, strode out of the house and approached the hired limousine. She had no idea why the Malfoys were using Muggle transport. Apparently, it was just 'something we do'. She had been forced into taking a Muggle car as well. She didn't understand why the Malfoys, who were very ant-Muggle, often used Muggle things – they often wore Muggle clothes, Narcissa particularly and it seemed, Muggle transport.

Draco seemed practiced at climbing in and out of the limo, as if he had done it before. He was wearing a black, flawless tuxedo. His friends were identical, even down to the casual smirk. She hated them. She wondered if she could curse them all from up here without being discovered.

He suddenly wheeled right around on the spot, as if he could sense being watched, and saw her. She stared at him defiantly, her eyes narrowing. He just grinned arrogantly and raised one arm in a mock salute.

She turned away quickly, tears running down her cheeks again. Oh Merlin – what was she doing? How could the Ministry do this? How?

A gentle knock on the door roused her from her consuming grief.

"W-who is i-t-tt?" She stuttered miserably.

"It's me." Alicia opened the door, took one look at Katie and shut it quickly behind her.

She hugged her, a proper hug none of that air-kissing, namby pamby stuff. Alicia was real. She didn't believe in fake displays of affection, for once Katie was glad of it.

"It'll be okay." Alicia murmured in her ear. "Promise. I'm always here, you know that."

Katie nodded, not really agreeing but realising that some sign of understanding should be shown.

"I'll go and delay them for five minutes, sort yourself out." She said teasingly, shoving Katie's elbow gently.

Katie half smiled, "Thanks. Really, thank you."

Alicia exited promptly and Katie heard her saying rather loudly to Narcissa Malfoy that, "Katie is just getting ready. God, leave the poor girl alone a minute!" She didn't hear Narcissa's retort but really wished she had.

Katie wiped her eyes and turned back to the mirror again.

She glared hatefully at the girl there. This girl was going to marry Draco Malfoy in just a few minutes. She hated this girl. She hated Draco. She hated herself.

To survive Draco and the loathsome Malfoys, to make sure they didn't break her spirit, to stay Katie in all of this awfulness, she needed to become this girl. A sort of façade. She concentrated for a moment. She could feel every cell of her body. She could almost feel her own heartbeat.

She took a deep breath and could, weirdly, feel herself becoming this girl. It felt a bit like a shroud had descended over her, an icy shroud. She wasn't Katie Bell, happy go lucky, Gryffindor through and through anymore, she was this girl – the 'perfect Pureblood wife'.

Her face was a cold, expressionless mask and she turned away and opened the door.

Whatever happened next, she was ready, she was safe, she was protected, she was…cold.


	32. Fred and Angelina 2

**A/N: Fred and Angelina, my personal favourites (I wish they were requested more often, hint hint!) for… Bergere, Nikki Diamond, Pilks and tamara72.**

**Sorry to disappoint you all, but people keep saying that they want Hermione and Ron to run away together like Harry and Ginny. There are a few reasons why this is not going to happen: firstly, I find myself really quite liking Ron and Padma, secondly (please don't kill me) I'm not a big fan of Ron/Hermione together and so I chose to have them as just good friends and thirdly, I think one rebellious couple is quite enough for any story.**

**Disclaimer: I'm so bored of these now, I don't own Harry Potter – never have, never will, okay?**

Fred x Angelina  
The Wedding Reception

Fred's POV

He couldn't quite believe it was all over, although it was indeed all over. The wedding was completed; he'd said the right words, completed the relevant paperwork and smiled at the correct moments. He was a married man now. He was no longer the bachelor, living the single life, spending his weekends in some dodgy pub chatting up flirty young witches. He actually sort of missed those days now. When they were happening, he'd taken them for granted, never really relished the thrill of chatting up some pretty girl. He wished he'd enjoyed them a bit more. After all, he'd never be able to do that sort of thing again.

He had never planned for things to happen like this – he'd always thought that he would settle down maybe in his late twenties, early thirties if the right girl didn't come along in time, at the same time as George (maybe have some sort of joint wedding, if the respective brides allowed it) and then they'd live either all in one house or directly next door to each other. They'd have a few kids apiece (all best friends, naturally), expand the business a bit more, send the sprogs off to Hogwarts and continue much in the same manner for the rest of his life. It sounded, to him, like the good life.

Marrying young had not been his intention. Marrying Angelina Johnson had also not been on his radar. They'd dated very casually at school but neither had taken it seriously. He hadn't seen her for years, never thought they would end up together. Now, hell, they were man and wife.

Scary. What was also scary was the sudden attraction he had to Angie. It had taken him completely by surprise, one minute he'd seen her as fairly nice looking. Sure he liked her; they'd been dating for a month or so. His feelings for her were new, easy, simple. The moment he'd said those vows and signed some ruddy bit of paper he suddenly fancied the pants off of her. Why had he never noticed how gorgeous she was?

She had this perfect clear skin, honey toned. Long, lustrous hair, almost black, it was shiny and soft. It had never been his sort of thing before – he preferred pale skinned giggly, blondes as a general rule of thumb. Angie wasn't a giggler. She laughed if she found something funny. She laughed rarely; Fred had to try pretty hard to make her laugh. He liked her laugh.

And that body – Merlin above. She had long shapely legs, a neat little waist, slender figure…She had a lovely smile as well, sort of shy but serious. And those eyes! Beautiful, dark, large, rimmed with long dark lashes.

He mentally slapped himself. This was getting out of hand. He was Fred Weasley for Merlin's sake; he did not wax lyrical over any girl. Although, a tiny traitorous voice piped up, she is your wife, not just some girl. You're allowed to, it added happily. The voice bore more than a passing resemblance to Ron, his most irritating brother.

"Mate, the DJ wants to start the first dance now." George's voice said suddenly, accompanied with a hearty clap on the shoulder.

"Right, right. Where's Angie?" Fred replied hurriedly.

"Here." Angelina said, tapping him on the shoulder and wearing an amused expression.

"Ah, right."

Fred took her hand, George nodded at the DJ and soft music appeared from seemingly thin air.

He pulled her to him and laid a hand on her waist, the other clasped to his chest. A hushed silence fell over the previously noisy room followed a brief minute later by applause and cheering.

Fred distinctly heard Lee yell, "Nice one mate!"

He smothered a smirk and Angelina scowled slightly. It seemed that Fred wasn't the only one to have heard him – apparently Katie had as well because Lee suddenly cried out. He spun on the spot, managing to make it look like an intended dance move, and saw Lee backed up in a corner, Katie's wand on him threateningly.

"Look." He murmured in Angie's ear and spun again.

He felt Angie's chuckles against his body and then deliberately tried not to think of it. He watched her smiles and thought again how beautiful she was. His feelings for her now were quite different – they were jumbled and confused, they were frightening, they changed every now and then, he wasn't even sure what those feelings were, a whole new experience for him. It had all been so black and white before – either you liked a girl or you didn't. Either you liked a girl as a mate or you liked them as something more. Clear, defined, it was simple. Now, he had no idea whether he liked her or maybe even…loved her, if he liked her as a friend or if he fancied her, if it was just attraction or maybe something new and real, if it was just the contract or his own real feelings or a mixture of the two.

Mate, a voice which resembled George said, you sound like a pathetic pansy, cut it out.

Angelina looked up at him then and grinned suddenly and breathtakingly, "Love you." She said quietly.

He swallowed, "Yeah. I l-love you too." He said honestly, inwardly berating himself for the stutter, how embarrassing!

He was ecstatically happy though. He was married to the most amazing girl ever and he loved her and she loved him back.

Now this, this really was the good life.

Angelina's POV

She was a married woman now. Scary thought really. She was actually married. And to Fred Weasley of all people! That had never crossed her mind that was for sure – Fred Weasley.

At school they'd been friends, close friends, originally all part of one big group and later finding that they actually liked one another despite their respective friends.

They'd dated for a bit, nothing serious. Fred had been known as a bit of a flirt and Angelina refused to get hurt. Anyway, he had never actually asked her if she wanted anything serious and so she'd told herself she didn't so often that, over time, she'd actually convinced herself she didn't.

When the twins had left Hogwarts, in an infamous blaze of glory, Angelina had laughed along with the rest, pretended she didn't care and then spent evenings crying in the Prefect's Bathroom. After the Final Battle, she had forced herself to walk away from Fred (after ascertaining from a distance that he was absolutely fine). She hadn't seen Fred for almost a year and then they'd been matched.

Matched under the new marriage law which decreed that they would be married in just a month or two, she'd been so angry, so angry with the Ministry. Eventually, her old feelings for Fred had returned. It was different this time around though – he really did care about her and they had a clearly defined future together. It was different this time and she thought might just have fallen head over heels for him.

The strength of her feelings scared her, sent shockwaves through her stomach whenever she thought about it, made her heart beat faster, too fast, whenever he was nearby. She'd been very aware of him beside her whilst she signed the necessary paper just after the official wedding service. She wondered how much he had been thinking of her that time. Then, she'd signed it, turned around to face him and all but fainted on the spot.

Wow, she'd thought he was good looking but this – this was something else entirely. How had she never noticed his strong features, chiselled jaw line, broad manly shoulders? Why had she never realised how intense his gaze was, how brooding his eyes turned when he was thinking, how alluring and cheeky his smile was? She'd forced herself to look away, a little worried that if she didn't she would embarrass herself publicly. Luckily, only Fred seemed to have noticed her sudden attraction. He'd just tactfully averted his eyes, blushed very faintly and then leaned down to sign his own name.

She hadn't noticed his reaction after signing on the dotted line, her mother had distracted her with words of pride and love, although she hoped that he felt like she did now.

They had rented a little, Muggle village hall for their wedding reception. It was decorated simply and cheaply, somehow managing to look pretty good despite their lack of funds. Tables filled with family and friends lined the edges of the room, they'd just eaten and now it was almost time for the dancing to begin.

She watched Fred discreetly out of the corner of her eyes as he concentrated very hard on something. The DJ summoned George over, spoke rapidly to him and George returned.

He smacked Fred manfully on the shoulder. "Mate, the DJ wants to start the first dance now."

Fred appeared to wake from his trance. "Right, right. Where's Angie?"

She rose to her feet, smiling at his bewildered expression as his head flipped from side to side trying to find her. She tapped him on the shoulder. "Here."

"Ah right." He looked mildly embarrassed.

He whisked her onto the dance floor and drew her close. She could feel his warm hand on her hip and their hands were clasped against his chest. Carefully, she rested her head against him. The crowd smiled and clapped and whooped excitedly. She could see lots of people she knew, certain faces jumping out at her - Katie, grinning from ear to ear, George mouthing something at Fred, Luna holding his hand and looking dazed as ever, Hermione and Ron chatting happily and clapping as they did so, Molly Weasley looking like she just might explode with pride and satisfaction.

She heard Lee Jordan shout something like, "Nice one mate."

Crude, lewd boy. She decided against hexing him into the next century – this was her wedding day, she should be serene and elegant. She would leave inflicting physical injury on him to someone else. For now...

She also heard his yells as Katie shot a quick jinx at him. She stifled a smugly satisfied smirk.

Fred twirled them around on the spot, clearly trying to get a good look at what was happening. She could almost feel his grin and then he spun so she could see.

He leaned down to whisper in her ear, "Look."

She couldn't help but smile – Katie had her wand pointed at Lee who appeared to be pleading with her desperately not to hurt him. She laughed and felt Fred chuckle along with her.

She was suddenly overwhelmed by a rush of love for him. She wanted to tell him, wanted him to know that really, she did love him, loved him very much. It was her wedding day after all; there was no moment more perfect than this one. And anyway, who knew when the opportunity would arise again. She lifted her head up, he was watching her. She smiled, "Love you."

He swallowed hard. "Yeah. I l-love you too." He grinned back, then ducked his head slightly.

He loved her. He loved her. He loved her!

Could life get any more perfect? Right there, right then in that second, Angelina doubted it very much.


	33. Lee's Turn

**A/N: Nikki Diamond put in a request for Lee's POV, so here it is. My apologise for the length, it's a sort of filler chapter.**

**Disclaimer: I still do not own Harry Potter. I'm a teenage school girl, do you really think I'm ever going to own any part of HP? Really?**

Lee's POV

The way I see it, they did me both a favour in eloping. After all, I didn't actually want to marry Ginny now, did I? She's like my little sister. It would never have worked. It would have been awkward. It just would have been plain weird.

This way I can do what I like. This way I can be single. This way I can keep my best mates. They disowned me when I was matched with Ginny and it hurt. It really hurt. I pretended it didn't, but in reality I was all torn up. I knew why they were freezing me out but on the other hand, it wasn't like I had a choice, it was bloody unfair. It was boring those few weeks without them winding me up and playing stupid, hilarious pranks, it was weird having them whisper together and not know what they were plotting, to not be part of it, it was lonely not having my best mates about.

Fred, George and I have been best friends since the first year when we were all frightened little eleven year olds. Okay, so maybe we were never exactly frightened, 'cocky' is probably a better word. As well as us three boys, we also managed to befriend Katie Bell, Angelina Johnson and Alicia Spinnet. Bloody good bunch of girls, they're my best friends as well, even after all these years I don't know how they put up with us.

The twins are my real best friends though, you know, the ones you'd tell anything, the ones you'd save from a burning building, the ones you'd probably die for. I know that they have will always each other as their best friend; I used to get a bit jealous over it all but I'm okay with it now. After all, they're twins, it's only natural. I know I'm still both of their second best friends and that pretty much adds up to the same thing. I could never choose between them, though. Everyone always asks me who my favourite is, and they think I'm lying when I say I could never choose between them, they never say it but I can see it in their eyes. Most people have a favourite – some prefer Fred, he's more boisterous, more exuberant, more likely to think of the pranks, the brains of the operation, others favour George, he's still incredibly loud, don't get me wrong, but he's also a bit quieter, more likely to show his sensitive side (and despite what everyone thinks, they both do have a sensitive side, they just hide it well), more of a follower than a leader.

They complement each other perfectly, balance each other out – if one of 'em haven't got whatever it is – a personality trait, whatever – then the other has. I cannot imagine what they would do without each other.

I'm the third member, the one on the outside but on the inside as well. Obviously I'll never be privy to the whole twin bond thing, but I'm pretty darn close. I'm closer to them than probably anyone else on this entire planet. I'm less well known than them, or less notorious, however you want to put it, bit quieter, less likely to get in trouble for a prank during our school days and more likely to become a mature, responsible adult. Whilst they set up the business, thereby enabling themselves to continue doing what they love whilst making money out of it and corrupting future younger generations, I went and got a boring old Ministry job. They teased me about it something rotten, called me Percy Jr for weeks. Needless to say, neither of us were all that impressed.

I started as an intern, fetching tea for everyone (Merlin only knows why they cannot use a summoning charm) and running errands that no one else wants to do. On my third day, I had to remove a nest of Bowtruckles from an office on the sixth floor. My left thumb has never been the same since.

I've been there two years now, working my way up, very slowly. I have a proper job now, get a regular (and miserly) wage, have proper tasks to complete. Okay, okay so an awful lot of people don't want to work for the Ministry, cannot see the point, don't trust the authorities anymore, think my job is boring. Well, I agree. My job is boring, it is dull, it is mind numbing. But, you have to start somewhere, don't you?

I want to make something of my life. Some people reckon there's a better way to do it, but I always fancied the Ministry life. Fred and George started their hugely successful business, that's their dream; it's what they wanted to do. Molly Weasley has a huge family, it's her dream and it's how she wants to live. They made their choices; they chose to do that with their lives. I'm going to work my way up the Ministry ladder.

It's my dream – good job, preferably head of something, part time Quidditch commentator, good money, nice big house, beautiful wife, heaps of friends, maybe a kid or two.

Of course, Ginny is beautiful in her own way, sort of in the way that any older brother thinks his little sister is too pretty for her own good. But, she could never be a Ministry wife. Whenever I dreamed of my perfect life, she didn't feature in it. She was never part of the dream. Don't get me wrong, I love her like my own sister, but she's not my ideal wife material. She could never be anyone's wife – except Harry's. Personally, I wish them every happiness and the very best of luck. If anyone is going to evade the Ministry, they will. They deserve to, they've been through a lot between them, more than most others and they deserve happiness. I'm really glad they've found it together. I'm not bitter, I'm not jealous and I'm not heart broken.

For some reason everyone seems to treat me like I am, or should be. Molly keeps offering me cups of tea and words of sympathy, Alicia actually Floo-ed over the other day to check if I was okay, people kept offering me words of sympathy at Fred and Angelina's wedding. It was annoying, to tell you the truth. Of course I'm not upset by it all– I wasn't in love with Gin, I didn't fancy her, I didn't choose her. Why should I be upset? She's done what she wants to do and I'm going to live how I choose.

I'm praying desperately that I won't be assigned another partner. I mean, presumably there is no one left – the Ministry has matched absolutely everyone up, they're not allowing changes or swaps, there are no exceptions. Who could possibly be left for me to be forced to marry?

I think, although I don't want to admit it and then be disappointed, I think I will be exempt from the law. Of course, this creates problems in its own – for example, I will be the only single person my age left in the entire country. So, it's goodbye to casual dating and hitting on random girls in seedy nightclubs. That's okay, I prefer to meet girls when they aren't intoxicated – that way they usually remember it the next day. Secondly, I won't ever be able to marry someone my own age. Younger wife – sounds pretty damn good to me. Thirdly, I'll have to wait until all those sixteen year olds grow up and want to settle down. It's okay, I can deal with a few single years. No biggie.

I'm going to be awful lonely for an awful long time though. Everyone around me will be married, having kids, talking about mortages and the married life and complaining about their kids/spouse/dog/etc. I can deal with it though, I'm a grown man, I can deal with this little thing. And anyway, I'll know that a whole lot of people want to be me. I can deal with the loneliness.

It'll all be worth it. It's worth it because when I meet her, and I will meet her, the one, my dream girl, I'll be able to choose her myself. I'll be able to chat her up, ask her out, date her casually. I'll be able to marry her exactly when I like. I can have kids with her, if we so choose, it won't be the Ministry's say so when we reproduce.

Life's going to be good.


	34. Percy and Cho 3

**A/N: For tamara72 who requested Percy and Cho. **

**Just so you know, the first paragraph is Percy and then the second is Cho and it swaps between them all the way through. I think you should be able to tell exactly who is speaking.**

**Disclaimer: I still don't own Harry Potter.**

Percy x Cho  
Marriage Offices

He didn't really have time for this; he had an awful lot of work to do back in the office. He could almost imagine his in-tray building up as he stood here fidgeting nervously. He glanced fretfully at his watch for the sixth time in less than a minute. Cho glared at him, for the sixth time in less than a minute.

She was seething. This was their wedding day and Percy had reluctantly taken a half day off of work to be married. They weren't having a honeymoon; they weren't even marrying in a church. She was mad and upset and cross and weary and so very hurt. It wasn't like she wanted to marry him, any more than he wanted to marry her, but at least he could have the common courtesy to at least look slightly enthusiastic. He didn't even seem to notice her anger, much to her chagrin; her glares were going seemingly unheeded.

He wished that the queue would hurry up – there were four couples in front of them. He had to get back, he had a very important afternoon meeting and he absolutely could not be late for it.

She had other things to do actually. She'd realised that Percy was not even taking her out for a meal after their hurried wedding service and so had made her own plans. That way she wouldn't have to go home and sit alone on her wedding day. Lavender had promised to take her out shopping and possibly for a manicure or something in a little Muggle beauty parlour that Lavender adored. Lavender had even promised not to say even one word about Harry or Ginny.

He looked at his watch again, wondering if perhaps the twins had charmed it to go faster or something. It was just the sort of irritatingly stupid thing they would do. After all, there was no way time could be passing so quickly, was there?

She glared at him again as he looked at his blasted watch. She wanted to curse it off of his wrist. It was obvious that he didn't want to be here. Well, she didn't either. He exhaled loudly and impatiently, the couple in front turned around to stare at them insolently and Cho almost died of embarrassment. Merlin, could he be any more irritating?

The marriage officiator finally emerged from his back office. Percy wondered if the marriage officiator could be bribed into letting them jump the queue. He watched as the first couple in the line – a tiny, tearful brunette who looked horrified at her match and a huge man with a shaved head and three tattoos who leered at her sickeningly – stepped up to the officiator. He began speaking and Percy zoned out, wondering precisely how long this was going to take and whether all of those words were strictly necessary.

Finally, the officiator began the first marriage. The couple were obviously ill suited. It seemed that the couples who loathed each other went for a legal marriage service rather than an actual wedding. Weddings were for those who were pleased with each other, those who liked each other and those who might even be in love. She watched, with silent empathy and sympathy, as a small girl, who didn't look much older than seventeen, was joined in holy matrimony to the largest man she had ever seen. Poor girl.

He noted the time – 10:23 am. Maybe the marriage would only take five minutes, that way it would be just fifteen minutes before their turn and he could be back at the office by 11am. That would be good – he could make a start on all the legal paperwork that the new Marriage Law offices seemed unable to deal with correctly. He disliked inefficiency in any form and the Marriage Law offices appeared to do absolutely nothing. He, Percy, had done a lot of the filing and the paperwork, other departments had taken over relevant parts – the Department of Magical Buildings had taken care of the required bedroom chambers at Hogwarts, the Transport Network had sort all the travel arrangements necessary to ensure every couple could meet up regularly, the Secretarial Offices had helped him to file and register all the pieces of paperwork required to make these marriages legal. It had been a huge task; the Minister had been impressed though. That was a good thing; maybe he'd get a pay rise?

The first couple were asked to hold hands which they did with some trepidation and a large dose of fear and the officiator held out his wand. He muttered something and a stream of golden light shot out of the tip and wrapped itself silkily around the joined hands. The marriage was complete.

The first marriage had taken eight minutes. That was three minutes longer than necessary. All that fancy stuff, all the little embellishments, all the enhancements, they were unnecessary. They could just be left out. Maybe the officiator would sort that out for them, just skip all the boring bits and join their hands together. That would probably be enough.

The first couple left, the girl in tears and the man grinning from ear to ear. The second couple were married – an oddly tall pair who looked weirdly similar. Cho was suddenly hit by nerves. She was scared, terrified, worried. What was going to happen next? Why was she doing this? What had the Ministry done?

He pushed all thoughts of the marriage aside and thought, with some relief, about his desk and all the things he needed to do. That's it, Percy, just write a mental to-do list…don't think about the wedding…number one, start on marriage finalisation forms. Just breathe, don't think about it.

She didn't want this, she couldn't do this, she wouldn't do this. She wondered how far she could run before she would be found and brought back. Probably not that far, she wasn't like Harry and Ginny, the Ministry would find her. It would only delay the inevitable. She was going to marry someone she hated. Life could get no worse. She blinked back fat tears miserably, deciding firmly that crying wouldn't help the situation in any way. Pull yourself together, you are Cho Chang, you are strong, you can do this, just pull it together…

He glanced at his watch and caught a glimpse of Cho from the corner of his eye. Merlin, she was going to cry. What should he do? It wasn't like he could comfort her; he couldn't even tell her it would all be okay, that would be a lie. It wasn't going to all be okay. For only the second time in his entire life, Percy hated the Ministry. Why had they done this? Did they not understand that forcing people into marriage was not the solution? Could he, Percy, get out of this? Of course not, he was a Ministry employee, it would be very important for them that he was seen to abide by the laws. If he ran, if he disappeared, went into hiding, they would find him, he'd be high priority. He was an employee; it would be very embarrassing for the Ministry if one of their own broke the new laws. He had to stay, he had to do his duty to Cho, to the Ministry, to the wizarding world, he had to marry her.

She wasn't going to cry. There was absolutely no need for tears. She forced herself to concentrate on something else. Helplessly, she looked upwards. She saw a flicker of movement and saw Percy had drawn is wand. She watched, baffled, as he drew a complex pattern in the air and then half smiled at her. He looked away very quickly and she looked upwards again. Written in large black letters in the air was, _"Sorry. It'll be okay. We'll make it be okay."_

Suddenly, it hit him. He couldn't directly tell her what he was feeling – a marriage ceremony was in full swing, talking would be unbearably rude. But, he could write it somewhere. As she glanced upwards, desperately blinking back tears, he drew his wand. He could feel her confused gaze as he mentally recited the correct words and moved his wand in a complicated series of movements. Then, he looked at her, she looked back. He half smiled, she didn't. He dropped his gaze and she looked upwards.

That was nice of him. Maybe he was human after all. Maybe he wasn't completely cold and dull. Maybe it would all be okay. She tapped him on the arm boldly and murmured, "Thank you." He nodded curtly and the third couple's marriage ceremony began.

They were next in line. That was good. He wondered if perhaps going back to work was the best idea. After all, it was his wedding day. Maybe it would be rude to just leave her. It was what he wanted to do, but it wouldn't be right. How were they ever going to be okay if they didn't talk? Maybe he should ask her out for lunch or something. He probably should at least ask. The worst she could do was say no and it wasn't like he'd be that upset or anything. Her rejection didn't mean anything to him, after all. He'd ask her after this blasted wedding ceremony.

Finally, the third couple left, studiously avoiding the other's gaze and wearing identical pained expressions. It was their turn. She was about to be married. Merlin, this was big.

The officiator summoned them forwards with an oddly regal air. He was clearly revelling in his sense of power, Percy thought. Percy stepped forwards and Cho followed. He didn't register the words; he was trying not to think about what he was doing. If he listened, if he thought about what the man was saying, it would become too real. It couldn't be real, if it was then he would do something he'd regret, he had to pretend it wasn't really happening.

Merlin – it was happening. She didn't concentrate properly on the words, distracting herself by imagining what she and Lavender would have for lunch. Watercress salad…chicken sandwiches…marriage…wedding… chocolate mousse… Mrs Percy Weasley…

The registrar asked them to hold hands. Cho didn't move. Percy, manfully, stuck his hand out and she slipped hers into his unwillingly. It felt wrong; her hand didn't fit in his properly. They were wrong though, they weren't really meant to be.

His hand was cold. It felt weird. It felt wrong. It was wrong. The golden light wrapped itself around their joined hands, flashed brighter for a second and then disappeared. Instantly and in perfect unison, they dropped their hands. She was married. She was Cho Weasley, Mrs Percy Weasley…Oh Merlin.

He was a married man now. This was big, this was weird, this was wrong. All plans of lunch disappeared from his head, right now he needed to get back to work and work and work and work until all he could think of was numbers and figures and official documents.

We were wrong right from the start. We'd never be right, would we?

We were never going to work, were we?


	35. Dean and Pansy 2

**A/N: A Dean and Pansy chapter for carrotcucumber and Dumbledore's Mum.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own any part, or whole, of Harry Potter.**

Dean x Pansy

He stood peering hopefully out his bedroom window, like he had done every morning for a week, praying fervently that today would be the day that the letter came. He had been waiting every day for three hours – from eight until eleven (which were normal posting hours) – for seven days now. He was two hours into his watch and beginning to think that it was a hopeless case, the letter was not coming today.

Suddenly, a very tiny grey speck appeared in the far distance, dark against the white clouds. Dean strained to see if it was an owl. It certainly looked like one.

As the owl grew closer, its' shape grew more defined and Dean could clearly see a letter clamped in its beak. He found himself actually praying to God, he was a Muggle, he figured that God still applied to him, that the letter bore good news. It had to bring good news.

Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, the owl landed gracefully on his window sill and Dean yanked the letter away. It hooted disdainfully and ruffled its' feathers, Dean threw it a treat. Once it had departed again, he sat on his bed, holding the letter in his open hands. Shaking hands, he noticed, that was a little pathetic.

Slowly and carefully, ensuring that he did not tear the letter at all, it was too precious to rip; he slid his finger under the flap and broke the seal. It was a purple seal with a fat 'M' in the centre. It was the letter. It was a Ministry letter. Today was the day. Was he going to be lucky?

He slid the letter out and scanned it eagerly.

'_To Mr D. Thomas,_

_We are obliged to inform you that your request for an appeal has been accepted. _

_Although, the legal loophole you applied under has now been closed, the law will still apply to your hearing._

_The hearing will be on 29__th__ of September, at 10am, in Courtroom Ten. Please arrive promptly as the hearing will not be delayed for any reason. Until the hearing has been completed, you will not be obliged to partake in a marriage to Miss P. Parkinson._

_You are free to enlist the services of a lawyer, or if you so wish, you can argue your case alone. We enclose details of a Ministry run law service, please feel free to contact them for help and advice._

_A duplicate of this letter has been sent to Miss Parkinson; however, to avoid conflict in evidence and the ruining of a case, we do ask that the two of you have no further unsupervised contact._

_Yours,_

_Mr P. Weasley_

_(on behalf of the Minister of Magic, Kingsley Shacklebolt)_

Dean whooped loudly and punched the air – he was getting a hearing, this had to be good news.

He'd been angry and nervous as everyone else had been when the new law had been introduced. However, he had hoped, along with every other male in the country, that he would get someone, you know… decent. As it turned out, he hadn't. He'd been lumbered with the awful Pansy Parkinson. He didn't know a lot about her, but what he did know he didn't like. She was a Slytherin, which was enough to put him off her for starters. Secondly, she had been rather infatuated with Draco Malfoy. This made her akin to the devil, in his book. Thirdly, she had tried to betray Harry in the Final Battle. She was effectively a Voldemort supporter. She'd been an enforcer under the Carrow's regime, he'd later learnt. So she was cruel and unkind and vicious. She wasn't sounding like ideal marriage material.

She was pretty much the opposite of Dean's ideal woman. His ideal girl was a Gryffindor, or a Ravenclaw at a push, pretty, kind and completely in love with him. Pansy was none of these things. Why on earth would he want to marry her? The Ministry had said that personalities would be taken into account, so why had they been matched? She was nothing like him. It seemed, to him, that the Ministry had simply pulled the names out of a hat. Actually, they probably had some magical way of randomly matching things. He bet that they hadn't even looked at the pairings properly, just matched them and stuck the names on letters and hadn't thought anymore about it.

When he had finally gotten over the horrible shock, he had put every second of time he had (and he did have an awful lot of time – Hogwarts didn't start again until November, his family had to go back to work and school and his friends were all busy getting married) into finding a way out. It had been tricky, frustrating, time consuming and tiring but he had finally found a legal loophole which gave him a hearing.

Now he had the hearing, he had to work on a case. After all, he had to win. The consequences if he didn't were hard to even think about. He could not marry that Parkinson thing.

He grabbed a pad of notepaper and began scrawling down ideas he would use in his case. Definitely something about mismatched personalities, mention the war…yes, definitely the war, draw on how she was a Voldemort supporter….yeah, tried to betray Harry.

He had to win this, he was going to win this, he needed to win this.

-

The owl came as a bit of a shock to her. Of course, she hadn't wanted to marry Dean but she hadn't thought of doing anything about it. Everyone said that there was no way around it and she had believed them. She wasn't used to independent thinking; everything in her life had been handed to her on a golden platter. Why should she try and think of a solution to a problem, if someone else would do it for her?

It wasn't like there was any other choice of prospective suitors – everyone was taken. Even Draco, with his money and 'name', hadn't been able to get out of it.

She had simply cried for a long time and then resigned herself to it. She hadn't spoken to Dean, he hadn't contacted her either. She didn't really know anything about him, she thought he had been in some of her classes but she'd never spoken to him.

One of her friends had said he was the one who had dated Ginny Weasley before Harry Potter did. Another friend had said he had once played Chaser on the Gryffindor Quidditch team. Draco had told her he was a Mudblood.

That was all she needed to know. Clearly, he would come from a poor, Muggle family. She had decided resolutely to never have anything to do with them. She was a respectable Pureblood family, one of the big ones who had not been utterly destroyed in the war. Many families, such as the Malfoys, had had their names blackened by declaring their support for Voldemort. The Parkinsons had never gotten involved; she had stayed at Hogwarts, protected by her name and good lineage and never said anything about Voldemort. It was a good survival strategy – the Parkinson name was still strong, none of her family had been sentenced to Azkaban yet her family had never been tarred by associated with Mudbloods and blood traitors.

Dean also, clearly, had awful taste – Ginny Weasley! So yes, everyone thought she was pretty but still…a Weasley. How low could one person sink? The Weasleys were the very epitome of bad taste for Pansy. She liked wealth and power and beauty and money and luxury. The Weasleys were common, associated with the most ghastly people, were poor and lived like Muggles. Her very worst nightmare had been being paired with a Weasley. At least she had escaped that horror.

She would have liked to have been paired with anyone who was Slytherin and wealthy. A year ago, she would have done anything to marry Draco. Now, she wasn't so sure. The Malfoy name was weak, hated, despised, blackened; it would not be good for her family if she'd married him.

Clearly, this Dean would not be bringing much to her family, nothing of use anyway. He would be the first Muggleborn ever to be part of the family, ever. This was embarrassing for her; she had let her family down. Her parents had been horrified; her grandparents had tried to invoke ancient wards that prevented such a marriage.

However, a light might just have appeared at the end of the tunnel. This letter might save her from this horrible marriage.

It said that Dean had managed to find a loophole and used it…they had been granted a hearing and did not have to marry before the hearing. This was good. This was very good; if they won the hearing then they would not be made to marry.

The chances of winning were…hard to predict. On the one hand, it was being held by the Wizengamot, they were fair, impartial and unlikely to conform to what the Ministry wanted. Also, the two of them were both fighting against the same thing. Neither of them actually wanted the marriage, this would make the case stronger. They would both be working on it, this would strengthen their arguments, help the case.

However, the Ministry was really cracking down on rebels to this law, cracking down hard. They had to enforce this hated law; if wrongdoers went unpunished then everyone would be rebelling against the law. Even if they were not made to marry each other, Pansy reckoned that they would be assigned other partners.

She had read in Witch Weekly all about Ginny Weasley and Harry Potter running away together. She had read that they were thought to be getting married, a legal expert had said that if they got married they would be unable to marry their assigned spouses and allowed to remain together. This would mean that their previous fiancées would be left unmarried. There had also been a few suicide cases, people driven to kill themselves by their pairings. This left a few people unassigned and unmarried. She would probably be matched with one of those.

That would be humiliating – marrying a left over, an unwanted person – but still preferable to marrying the Mudblood.

She rang the bell by her dressing table to call for a house elf. One appeared almost instantly and bowed deeply. She wrinkled her nose minutely, she didn't like house elves or having to deal with them, however they were efficient she did have to admit. They always did their work well and quickly.

"How can I help Miss?"

"I need you to find out who the best lawyer in Britain is and then hire him or her for me." She commanded, "That's all." She turned away, the house elf bowed again and departed.

She permitted herself a brief smile – she was going to get out of this marriage, she would not marry a Mudblood.

**A/N - IMPORTANT - I will not be able to write at all next week (Monday 28th, Sept - Sunday 4th, Oct). I will be updating again from Monday!**


	36. Draco and Katie 5

**A/N: Okay...I'm back! I started this yesterday, got too tired and so, unfortunately didn't get around to posting until today. I'm not sure when my next chapter will be up because my teachers have suddenly decided to give me so much homework I have no time to do anything. However I have now seen the virtues of a plan so I do know where my story is going, (which I think is a good thing!) please do keep reviewing and requesting!**

**This is a pretty short Draco and Katie chapter, unfortunately with no Draco in (he should be in the next one!) for christy86 and MidnightRosexx and Bergere.**

**Disclaimer: I still own no part of Harry Potter.**

Draco x Katie  
Katie and Alicia's Flat

She placed the last few items in her third cardboard box, then stepped back and stretched luxuriantly relishing the release of her cramped muscles. "I think that's it, Lissy."

Alicia nodded a little sadly, "That's it." She tucked the flaps of one of her own boxes down neatly.

"It's all over."

Both girls stood on opposite sides of the room, flanked by a few boxes each containing their possessions. The little set of rooms were now bare, stripped of the furniture and photographs and general clutter it normally held. They'd had to divide up some of their possessions – that had been the hardest bit, deciding which things belonged to whom.

At exactly the same moment both went to speak.

"I can't-"

"I cannot-"

They smiled in exact unison.

Alicia spoke, "I can't believe it's all over, Kate. This is it."

"I know. Just over a year, we've lived here. Together. And now…now it's all over."

"I'm going to Hogwarts." Alicia said, "And you're off to the Malfoy Mansion. We'll never get to live together ever again."

Katie nodded, holding back tears. She was so upset, she and Alicia were best friends and they had been ever since first year. They'd met on the platform, Katie had been saying goodbye to her parents when Alicia suddenly appeared beside her and asked if they could sit together. Alicia had told her, many years later, that she'd scrutinised every single first year that day before settling on her. Katie had laughed but secretly, she had been thrilled. They'd done everything together – gotten onto the Gryffindor Quidditch team (after months of secret practices, often after dark when they were supposed to be in bed), they'd chosen the exact same O.W.L.'s, they'd befriended the same people, liked and disliked the same things.

They'd always planned to live together when they left Hogwarts, although the war had delayed their plans, eventually they had bought this little flat together, saving every penny they had between them. Now, with the Law, they were being forced to live apart again.

Katie was practically being forcibly taken to the Malfoy Mansion; apparently no Malfoy bride ever had lived elsewhere. Alicia hadn't wanted to live in their flat alone and anyway, Oliver was based the other side of the world. Alicia was going off to Hogwarts again. Technically, she had finished her final year just before the war had really started. However, the impending war had seriously affected her grades and she wanted to retake her final year to improve her job chances. Several others their age were doing the same thing. Katie herself had considered this a few times, but her grades were pretty good anyway. She didn't really need to improve on them. And anyway, it wasn't like she could get a job.

Katie, personally, wasn't sure what she would do, or more precisely, what she was allowed to do. The Malfoys had stated very firmly, several times, that she could not work. Apparently, it would make them look bad; they would be the laughing stock of the Purebloods. It had continued much in this vein for almost one hour when Katie had dared to broach the subject. Narcissa had decreed that Katie could shop as frequently as she liked (and they had even given her access to the Malfoy vault at Gringotts), lunch with her and her Pureblood friends (and their daughters – who would be just Katie's age), attend any social events with Draco (as long as he invited her, she was dressed correctly and nicely and she was well learned in the correct etiquette) or relax at home (although, she should still be formally attired outside of her personal rooms in case any visitors dropped by). This seemed to be a rather limited range of options. The Weasley twins, in an attempt to cheer her up, had presented her with a very large box of all their latest tricks from the shop. Also, she was technically a Malfoy; this meant she could do all sorts of things – like free the house elves. Oh, she would still find her little ways to rebel.

She was a Malfoy bride but they would not break her. They would never stop her being Katie. She would put up with everything they asked of her, become the perfect Pureblood wife if that's what they wanted on the exterior…but they would never break her spirit. Beneath her cold exterior, she would still be Katie Bell – Gryffindor, chatty, bubbly, best friend of Alicia and the Weasley twins and life and soul of the party. They could never stem her private thoughts now, could they?

Suddenly, she flew across the room and hugged Alicia. Without realising it or meaning to, both girls were in tears.

"I'm g-going to miss y-you so so so much. Hogwarts w-won't be the s-s-same without y-you." Alicia sobbed.

"I know…I don't k-know when I'll s-see you again…" Katie reflected miserably – Alicia probably wasn't the sort of person the Malfoys would encourage contact with. Not that that was going to stop her, Lissy had been her best friend for years. Even the Malfoys could not break their friendship up.

"We'll always be best friends, promise?"

"C-course." Katie stuttered.

"Even though we might not see each other much…I'll be at Hogwarts. But we'll still try and meet up, owl each other or something. Okay?"

Katie nodded. Alicia had always been the dominant friend; she was far bossier and commanding than Katie and so, got her opinions, thoughts and ideas across far more regularly and forcefully. It had almost caused arguments a few times, after all Katie liked to have opinions too, but it had always been that way and probably always would be.

She looked over Alicia's shoulder; she could see the spot of their little sofa. She could still imagine it, if she just closed her eyes; remember back to the day they bought it…

_*Flashback*_

_They stand in the centre of a shop, surrounded by a large number of expensive, showy sofas._

"_You know what…we don't even need a big sofa. Do we?" Katie says doubtfully, eying the sofa she wanted – huge, soft, buttery leather, utterly gorgeous, utterly expensive._

"_Naa." Alicia agrees, "We're not that big. And anyway, who needs a roomy, luxurious three-seater with recliner functions in beautiful, gorgeous chocolate leather?" She caresses the described sofa in front of her with a look of mock adoration on her face._

_Katie grins. Alicia smiles back. Suddenly, they are in fits of giggles, clutching each other and their sides as bemused customers gaze on and a scowling sales assistant moodily asks them to leave._

_*End of flashback*_

"Remember when we tried to actually get the sofa in?" Alicia said, following Katie's gaze.

"Merlin yes!" Katie chuckles.

_*Flashback*_

"_It's stuck! It's actually stuck!" Katie cries, clutching her end of the sofa, blocked outside in the corridor. She flops dramatically against her upturned end._

"_Don't be ridiculous!" Alicia calls from the other side of the door, her voice muffled by the sofa between them._

_It's a small sofa with two seats, covered in a very faded striped material. It wasn't their first choice – but it was cheap and now… it was theirs._

"_It is! I can't move it!"_

"_You can't move it?" Alicia says irritably._

"_Nope."_

"_Are you a witch or what?"_

"_Oh… right."_

_Sheepishly, Katie draws her wand, looks around and then mutters a spell under her breath. The sofa shrinks and she picks it up, then she places it in the correct spot and enlarges it again._

_Katie flops down on it, wearily, Alicia just raises one eyebrow and decides not to speak._

_*End of flashback*_

"I still cannot believe you didn't think of magic." Alicia said.

"Well, neither did you at first." Katie replied defensively.

Alicia just looked at her in disbelief. "How'd you think I carried it all the way up those stairs and got it through the door?"

"You mean… you made your end…lighter?"

"Yeah…didn't you?" Alicia said with a bemused smirk.

Katie just shook her head, slightly embarrassed. She looked around her, unable to quite meet Lissy's eyes. Suddenly, she gets caught up in a whirlwind of memories…

Late night chats, their regular movie nights, helping each other get ready for a big date, talking about boys, their house warming party organised by the Weasley twins, reminiscing about Hogwarts, their first disastrous attempts at cooking, that time the shower leaked all over the place, various hangovers and all the cures they had concocted in their tiny kitchen, the first time they tried to wash their clothes magically, hours spent trying on various outfits, laughing for ages at nothing in particular, confessing and confiding secrets, watching rubbish Muggle TV channels… they'd had so many happy times here. So very many happy times. She didn't know how much happiness she was going to have in the next phase of her life, she had to cling to these memories.

In her next life, she would have so much more than this little flat. She would have money, wealth, power, servants, a large house, a supposed 'catch' of a husband…but she would lose so much – her friends, her freedom, her independence, her working life, her love life, laughter, happiness…

She was ready to move out now. Carefully, she dried her tears, hugged Lissy goodbye a few more times, promised to write soon and gave Lissy her key.

Then, she waved her wand lavishly and walked out of the door, her boxes flying behind her in an orderly fashion.

Outside the door, she slumped against the door frame and concentrated for a few moments. She brought up her icy façade, her perfect Pureblood wife face, her protection against the Malfoys…the smile left her face, her eyes grew cold, and she strode from the building, never looking back.

She was ready to become Katie Malfoy.


	37. George and Luna 4

**A/N: A very requested George and Luna chapter for Nikki Diamond, FaithfulHPReader, MidnightRosexx, Dumbledore's Mum, MioneJeanWeasley, Lunaclaw14, canis3 and tamara72. ****I was going to write Fred/Angelina next, but there were so many requests for these two, that Fred and Angie will be the next chapter!**

**Also, please do keep reviewing - they really do make my day!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. 'Kay?**

George x Luna  
Platform Nine and Three Quarters

She had missed Hogwarts. At first, she had hated the place. She had been lonely and homesick and mocked. She had hated the feeling of institution, the strict routine, the unfriendly people, the teasing and the lack of friends. She had liked learning magic though, she had always been a bright girl and learning was her forte. She had sort of found her place, although it was a tight squeeze, amongst the other Ravenclaws. So no, they weren't always kind to her and they never did include her in things, but they were still sort of like a family. The closest she had ever had to family anyway.

Then, she had met Ginny. Ginny was nice. She was friendly and stopped people teasing her. Ginny was the opposite of Luna really – she was a redhead, she was feisty, she was very popular, she was a Gryffindor, she could be friends with anyone and yet, she made time to talk to Luna. Luna had really appreciated that.

When she and Ginny became friends, she started to feel like she might be starting to tread water rather than drowning in it. She later found other friends – Harry Potter, who had been through so very much, fought for his life so many times and yet was so brave and lovely, Hermione Granger who was sceptical in everything Luna held most dear but still helped Luna out whenever she could, Ron Weasley who was somehow related to Ginny and somehow managed to be incredibly rude and insensitive and somehow really rather nice and Neville Longbottom who everyone said was stupid and idiotic, but actually was incredibly lovely just a little bit forgetful.

She started to really love Hogwarts, just like everyone else. She had found her place in the school.

She had never thought the day would come when she would, yet again, wish that she didn't have to go back to Hogwarts. Unfortunately, it had come - in the form of George Weasley.

She thought she might actually be in love with him. That was a little frightening. After all, love was something that only happened once, it was precious and special and what if it was ruined by their temporary separation?

She didn't want to leave George. Okay, so she wouldn't really be leaving him as such. She'd still see him three times a week. But it wouldn't be the same. They wouldn't be spending long hours in their cave, they wouldn't spend evenings in The Burrow laughing and joking with the rest, they wouldn't be together all the time. George hadn't actually said he didn't want her to go to Hogwarts, but it was pretty clear.

However, she really did have to go back to Hogwarts. She had gotten decent O.W.L.'s. But, she had no N.E.W.T's and therefore, no job prospects. She wouldn't actually have to work, George earned an awful lot of money, but she wanted to. She was, by nature, a hard worker and she wanted to make her contribution. She wasn't sure yet what she was actually going to do, but she needed qualifications to get anywhere in life. She did have to go back. She needed to go back. She wasn't quite finished with Hogwarts yet.

She wasn't even going back as Luna Lovegood. She was Mrs George Weasley now. Never, in a million years, would she have ever expected to become a Weasley. She was really happy to be one though, they were a lovely family. They were her family now.

She stood facing the cheery red train with a whole babble of mixed emotions – anticipation, excitement, sorrow, worry. She wanted to leap onto the train and immerse herself back into the familiar routines and faces and classes. She also wanted to stay on this platform here until the train left, still clutching George's hand and then turn away and go back home.

She wondered for a split second if Fred and George would mind all that much if she moved in with them. They had a tiny flat over the top of the shop. Actually, she remembered, Fred was probably moving out. Angelina wasn't going back to school, she hadn't much liked the education side of school and had decided that she had finished with learning, her and Fred were very close, a married couple now. They would want their privacy and Fred certainly had enough money to buy his own place.

George wordlessly pulled her away from the throng of people and to a quieter corner. She watched crying mothers, fathers imparting final words of wisdom, hundreds of Hogwarts students milling about happily, first years struggling under the burden of heavy new trunks. It was reassuringly familiar.

George turned to face her, "You have to go, you know."

She knew he was right. He looked pained to have to say the words. She felt pain to hear the words. But he was right. She did have to go back. She had to finish her education off, she had to say goodbye to her former home and she had to find new memories of Hogwarts that didn't involve fighting and Death Eaters and maimed bodies.

She nodded pathetically. "I don't want to though."

George half smiled, "Yes you do, Luna. You do want to go back, you need to go back."

She nodded again.

He squeezed her hand very gently. He always was so gentle with her, so patient, so reassuring, so very lovely. "We'll be okay."

Without really realising it, this was what had been bothering her the most. The separation, what if it didn't work? What if they stopped loving one another? What if they didn't even miss each other?

She couldn't lose him. Not that she could actually lose him, in the eyes of the law he would always be hers, but emotionally they could drift apart. She was a fairly strong person, the war had made her even tougher, but she didn't think she would be able to cope if that happened.

"Promise?"

He grinned. She loved his smile. It was sort of welcoming and cheeky and even though he could be smiling at any number of people, it always felt like he was smiling at you alone. "Course. I love you Luna."

He'd said it a few times before and she felt exactly the same time every time she heard it – utterly elated. "I love you too." She said softly and a little shyly. She hadn't come from the sort of family where public declarations of love where a daily occurrence. She still felt a little awkward saying things like this out loud.

"Good." He grinned again, "Now, let's go get you on that train before all the good spaces are gone."

He towed her back through the bustling crowd to where her trunk stood, just next to the crowd of assorted Weasleys.

He dropped her hand for a minute to swing her trunk up in his arms. Carefully, he lifted it onto the train. She thanked him, after all, there was no way she would have been able to lift it herself. She had never really thought material possessions were all that important and previous years had seen her trunk almost empty excluding the essentials. This year however, she had wanted to take so many things – a huge group photograph of all the Weasley clan together, a magical flower George had presented her with unexpectedly one day, a photo of Ginny and her, a rock with a strange leaf print embedded in it gifted to her by Hermione after a Muggle holiday with her parents. All of these little things she wanted to take with her, to have near her, to have as reminders of all of these people.

Not all of them were returning to Hogwarts alongside her – Harry, Hermione and Ron were. Well, Harry was supposed to be but him and Ginny were still on the run. Ginny had planned to attend this year as well. Neville wasn't – he had gotten a job in a magical greenhouse working with all sorts of interesting foreign plants. She couldn't remember who else was, a lot of people couldn't bring themselves to go back to the battle scene, their memories were too scary and too painful. She knew it would take a lot for all of them to walk back through the gates again. But she also knew that many people had to do it, they had to exorcise the ghosts, they had to make their peace and they had to create new memories of happy times at the castle.

George took her hand again and flashed a grin at her. The assorted Weasley clan converged on them then and she was swept away on a tide of hugs and kisses and farewells.

It was several minutes later when she finally managed to extract herself from the flurry of goodbyes and find George again.

He wrapped his arms around her – more flamboyant than usual, she noted, they weren't really into big public displays of affection. She wasn't really comfortable with them, but she didn't care now…they only had a few minutes.

"I'll see you soon. We're all Floo-ed in in two days time. I'll see you then." George said quietly. "Make sure you enjoy yourself. 'Kay?"

She nodded.

"And, just remember that I love you and you love me and we'll all be fine. And, next year, when you've finished Hogwarts, we can be together full time again."

She smiled in response to his words, imagining their life together in a way which surprised her. She was never like other girls, spending hours dreaming of their perfect married lives, and yet, here she was imagining along with the best of them.

"Now, off you go." He pecked her swiftly on the lips, hugged her close and pushed her gently towards the train.

She was one of the last ones on, as she climbed up, the conductor swung the door shut behind her. She stood on tiptoes to peer through the little window at the top. George waved and blew a discreet kiss. She grinned and waved back. The whistle blew and the train began to move.

"Goodbye!" She shouted.

"Remember, don't get caught by Nargles!" George yelled back.

The train moved out of sight, she turned away from the window.

_Don't get caught by Nargles. _She giggled and moved away down the train.


	38. Lavender's Interview

**A/N: For Lexxxx who came up with the idea of Lavender giving an interview. I loved the idea and decided to write it. Enjoy!**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Lavender. In fact, I don't actually own any part of Harry Potter.**

Lavender  
Her Flat

Some people said she was cashing in on her story. Some people said she was a money grabber. Some people said she was cheap and vicious.

She didn't care. Much. After all, she had been publicly humiliated. She was the one who had been hurt. Why shouldn't she get something out of it?

This interview would be her first one. She had been steadily receiving numerous offers of interviews, each with a huge price tag attached which increased daily. Finally when the sum had reached almost five hundred Galleons, she had accepted. Witch Weekly was her favourite magazine and very widely read, she had always wanted to give them an interview.

The five hundred Galleons would help her to pay off a few debts she still owed at various shops. She could purchase some new clothes she'd had her eye on for a long while. She could maintain her lifestyle for a few months longer. She could do another interview in a few weeks time, maybe when Harry and Ginny were finally caught or something.

The public were hungry to hear her side of the story. And today, she was going to deliver. They loved the whole scorned woman thing, lapped it up. It was going to end up being rather profitable. Okay, so marrying Harry would probably have gotten her more money – the wedding, the blissful married life interviews, maybe some first child photos. It would have been a whole lot more respectable as well. But she no longer had that option, Harry had ran away with Ginny Weasley and she was left alone.

It was wholly embarassing. And incredibly hurtful. She hadn't loved Harry or anything ridiculous like that. She was still a human being though and rejection, in any form and by anyone, cut deep. When the story had first broken, she'd wanted to die. She didn't think that anything more awful could have happened to her. The hurt was twofold. Firstly, she had been rejected. She had been hurt. She'd cried for almost a whole day. It had caused all sorts of horrible doubts to arise - what was wrong with her? Why did no men seem to like her? She knew deep down it was irrational. It didn't matter, did it? She didn't even like Harry that much. She didn't even want to marry him. It just hurt. Secondly, the media had had a field day. They'd written nasty articles about her, they said that Harry had left because of her, they said that Ginny was better than her, they said that she, Lavender, had driven Harry to run away. It had been vindictive and cruel. She hadn't been able to stop herself reading the reports. Every article concerning the whole thing, she had read. She didn't even really know why - it wasn't like they were complimentary about her. It was a sort of twisted self punishment, reading these new horrible articles, prolonging the agony. It was stupid really and yet, she still read them.

That was the third reason she was doing the interview - she wanted to read an article about herself that was not cruel or vicious or nasty. She wanted to read something about herself that was nice and fair and sympathetic.

Her mother wasn't very impressed. Lavender was one of the few Muggleborns who fully involved their Muggle parents in their wizarding lives. Her mother had apparently 'washed her hands of her'. Her mother said that giving interviews like this was classless and tasteless and nasty. Lavender hadn't cared. Much.

She shook herself from her daze and eyed herself critically in her dressing table mirror. Her skin was clear – courtesy of the finest magical skin care products available. She had carefully curled her blonde hair into perfect ringlets. She was actually rather famous for that particular hairstyle. She'd applied a very little make up, after all plastering it on really would be awful. She could still maintain a little of her dignity.

She had chosen a pink dress. Green robes and dresses were still very much in fashion. However, she'd never worn one. Being the Chosen One's fiancée made the wearing of dresses to match his eye colour rather passé. Now she was the scorned fiancée, she was supposed to hate Harry and so obviously green robes wouldn't convey the right message.

A knock on the door startled her. She rose gracefully and opened the door a fraction.

An eager brunette reporter clutching a violently orange notepad waved at her manically. A bored looking photographer stood behind her wearing a faint scowl.

"Hello!" The reporter said, "I'm Anna, we spoke on the phone."

Lavender nodded, she remembered the conversation clearly.

"Can I come in? We don't have a lot of time you see, the interview needs to be written up for tomorrow. It's probably going to be one of our best sellers. This issue is predicted to be big!"

Lavender opened the door a little wider to allow the irritating woman in. She noted with some distaste that Anna was still talking. The photographer lifted his camera sulkily and took a few shots of her immaculate home.

"Please sit." Lavender swept a hand at her lilac sofa.

The reporter sat. The photographer grimaced and sat beside her. Lavender herself sat down, ensuring that her hair and dress were arranged perfectly first.

"So, Lavender, if we just chat. Like we're old friends or something!" Anna laughed. Lavender didn't. "Well the Quick Quotes Quill will take notes for us and that will be that!"

Lavender merely inclined her head graciously.

"So." The quill wiggled with feverish enthusiasm. "I have here with me, dear readers, the one and only Lavender Brown, betrayed fiancée of the Chosen One. She has chosen our Witch Weekly publication to give her first exclusive interview since Harry eloped with the infamous Ginevra Weasley. Now, Lavender, the wizarding world has been clamouring to hear your story, firstly, how are you? You're looking particularly slender today…have you been dieting?" Anna rattled off quickly.

"It's called the heartbreak diet." Lavender said sadly and Anna practically bounced up and down with glee. "I'm coping though, thank you." Lavender continued quietly, "Obviously, I've had better days but I force myself to get out of bed each day."

"So, you and Harry have always been close, haven't you? Tell us how you met."

"Harry and I were at Hogwarts together. We were in the same house, Gryffindor, as everyone knows. We were close at school, good friends. I fought alongside him in the famous Dumbledore's Army and during the Great War."

"So, was it always just friendship between you, or did you always think there was…something more?" The quill was sprinting across the page to keep up with them.

"Harry and I were friends at first. But everyone always thought there was something between us, something more than just an innocent friendship." Lavender smiled faintly and the photographer took a quick snap.

"So, both of you were thrilled to be matched by the new Law then?"

"Oh yes," Lavender smiled, "I was overjoyed. And, I thought he was as well. He told me several times that he was happy we were to be married. I thought we were going to be together always. I thought we had something real."

"So, how are you coping with his departure?" Anna assumed a very fake sad expression.

"It's hard, I won't lie. It's a struggle every day to deal with the fact that he has really gone. Sometimes I want to just give up but I won't. I have to move on. I have to believe that there is something better for me just around the corner." She smiled. Anna grinned back.

"How do you feel about Harry now?"

"He's…well, I admire him very much for what he did in the War. However, I think he has shown a nasty side to his character here. I never thought he was capable of causing this much pain. He's shown his true colours."

"Now… what about Ginevra Weasley? What do you know about her? Is she really the scarlet woman every is saying she is?"

"Ginny was Harry's best friend's little sister. She comes from the sort of family who never had very much. At school, she was always all over Harry. Everyone knew she was a bit of a social climber. Harry was famous and rich; of course she'd try and get him. I don't blame her, who wouldn't instantly like Harry? I can't think why he likes her though; she isn't a very nice sort of person. Scarlet woman may be too strong a term, but she certainly hasn't much class."

"Aah…so you never liked her much?" Anna's eyes were sparkling with the scandal, she clearly enjoyed her gossip.

"Not really. Of course, I never knew her that well. She was a few years below me. I never had a lot of interest in her. I certainly never saw her as a threat." Lavender said dismissively. In her mind, she could see the headlines – "Lavender breaks her silence – I never saw her as a threat."

"How do you feel about her now?"

"I despise her. I think it is one of the cheapest, most awful things any woman can do to go after someone else's man. I think her and Harry truly deserve each other."

Anna nodded sympathetically. "Now Lavender, tell us…where do you think Harry and Ginny are now?"

"I really don't know. I expect they will have some sort of magical hideout, Harry is an exceptional wizard. He is perfectly capable of evading the Ministry."

"And, if Harry and Ginny were caught, would you take Harry back?"

Now, this was a tricky one. How should she play this? Cold, dismissive, brave, undecided, confident, no comment? "I'm not sure. It would be very hard to trust him again and I do believe that trust is the most important thing in any relationship. All I can say is…perhaps. You can never know what will happen in the future."

She silently congratulated herself on her answer – giving nothing away, a little slice of advice (possibly enough to get her an Agony Aunt position for the magazine), some personal details but not too much, quietly hopeful. The public would love it.

"Well, we all here at Witch Weekly hope you two may be reunited again one day!" Anna babbled, "Now, I'm afraid that's all we have time for."

"Thank you very much for your time. A big thank you to all your readers who have stayed so behind me throughout this ordeal," Lavender said.

"Thank you Lavender. We hope you're feeling better soon!"

Anna grabbed the quill from mid air and shoved it into her bag, pulling her hideous note pad out of the air as well.

"That was great." She beamed, "Now, we just need a couple of shots…John, here will take care of those." She waved a hand at the surly photographer, "And then it's all finished!"

Lavender nodded.

John rose to his feet and took a few shots, ordering her in a surly tone to wear various facial expressions and stand against several backdrops. Anna filled the silence with inane chatter. Lavender wished she would just be quiet. Finally, an hour or so later, they left.

Lavender perched on her sofa and grinned. Her first interview had gone very well, she was well on her way to being the wizarding world's new darling.


	39. Harry and Ginny 2

**A/N: A Harry and Ginny chapter for Selesteant, FaithfulHPReader, carrotcucumber, canis3, gWeasley77, Dumbledore's Mum, StarsInTheSky123 and airlinegal.**

**Disclaimer: I still do not own Harry Potter.**

Harry x Ginny  
Norfolk

"Marry me." Harry said suddenly, turning away from the window to face her.

Ginny blinked spastically. She had just been making up the single beds they had slept in, thinking of nothing, not expecting anything and then… bam, he'd just landed that on her. She stood frozen on the spot still clutching a pillow, face set in a perfect mask of shock.

Harry chuckled, moved forward and gently took the pillow from her. Ginny blinked again and seemed to wake from her trance.

"Of course!" She squealed launching herself at him at the exact same moment he reached for her. They collided, giggling stupidly like little children.

Harry was over the moon. He wanted to jump for joy or shout very loudly. Finally, Ginny Weasley was going to become his wife. He had waited a long time for this moment. It was always meant to be this way, he realised. They were meant to be married. Any remaining guilt he had felt over leaving Lavender stranded and taking Ginny away from her family left him suddenly. They were only doing what was right. Maybe they could return afterwards. After all, wizards were typically very traditional; they would not break up a marriage, not matter how unwelcome it could be.

Ginny reached up on tip toes for a kiss and Harry happily obliged.

Finally, they pulled apart. "We have to find a church. And someone to marry us." Harry said thoughtfully.

Ginny nodded, her hair bouncing enthusiastically in all directions. "Yes…what's a church?"

Harry just laughed, took her hand and Apparated her out of the bland guesthouse. They had been staying there for nearly a week now and both were heartily sick of it. It was mostly decorated in a dull grey shade with awful eighties fittings and peach shag pile carpet. Their room was very small, two single beds had been shoehorned inside of it. It came with the seemingly compulsory revolting carpet and sheets which didn't look quite clean. The landlady was lovely but ancient. Age had robbed her of her memory and she tended to forget things. On the first morning, they had come downstairs for breakfast ('always at seven until eight' she had said firmly the following morning) and shrieked at the sight of them. It later transpired she had forgotten that she had taken in guests the previous night.

They arrived at their final destination – the tiny rural church Harry had seen on one of their walks around the village. It hadn't been hard to find, the village was very small.

"It would have taken us two minutes to walk." Ginny complained. Although she had been born knowing she was a witch and had been surrounded by magic her whole life, she didn't believe in using magic unnecessarily. Muggles managed just fine using their own two feet, why couldn't wizards do that too?

"I just couldn't wait that long." Harry said seriously. Ginny forgot to be cross and just smiled slightly inanely.

The church was blocky and built from dark grey stone. A bell chimed dolefully from somewhere inside. Outside was a scrubby patch of grass, two ducks shuffled across it squawking miserably. A huge wooden door was set into one wall; it was peppered liberally with iron studs. It was flung open suddenly and a tall man strode out purposefully. Ginny almost laughed at the sight of him. Luckily, Harry shot her a meaningful look. He wore long black robes, she was used to this, this was very normal. However, he also wore a large necklace made of clearly fake gold and a weird white collar around his neck.

He drew up short when he saw them. "Hello there. Can I help you?" His tone was brisk and efficient. Harry thought he sounded more like an accountant or a businessman than a religious man.

"Yes. We'd like to be married." Harry said, stepping forward.

"Oh. Well, I'm afraid we do have a waiting list. I think the next available weekend is in November. I do have to warn you that the church does only seat fifty though, you can't have a huge wedding here."

"We don't want a huge wedding. We just want to be married, now."

"Oh. Well, I suppose I could. Just the basic service though, mind you, I have a christening this afternoon. I don't suppose you have any witnesses." He paused to gaze at them meaningfully and Harry shook his head. The vicar tutted loudly. "Okay, well I think our cleaner is still here. She will witness and…Mr Hall is inside. He will be the second. Come along."

Feeling a lot like two naughty schoolchildren, the two followed him into the church. It was cool inside and dim, lit with one main electrical light and an array of flickering candles. It clearly was not a rich parish – the paint on the walls was flaking and chipped, the pews were very basic and looked incredibly uncomfortable and there was a real lack of anything expensive or extravagant.

It sort of seemed right for them though, Harry thought. They didn't want anything big. They didn't want fancy. They didn't want anything lavish. They were a simple couple, how apt that they would be married in such a sparse church.

The vicar efficiently rounded up the stressed looking cleaner clad in a navy tabard and Mr Hall who was white haired, wore a very neat suit and had the air of someone who thinks they are important. Harry reckoned he was retired and knew everybody and everything in this entire village.

"We are gathered here today to witness the marriage of-" He paused, realising that he actually did not know the names of the two he was supposed to be marrying.

"Harry Potter and Ginevra Weasley." Harry inserted helpfully.

"Does anybody present know of any lawful reason why these two cannot be married today? If so then please speak now or forever hold your silence."

The cleaner raised an eyebrow and a silence echoed uncomfortably around the church. Harry thought that the vicar was laying it on a bit thick – there were five people in the church, excluding him and Ginny, there were three. These three people had never met them.

"Now, Harry, do you promise to love, comfort, honour and protect Ginevra for as long as you both shall live?"

"Yes." Harry said.

The minister repeated the words for Ginny.

As the pair had no rings, the vicar helpfully skipped over that bit and continued to the vows. Obviously, they had not written personalised vows so the vicar read them from his order of service. They weren't extravagant or glossy but they did the job.

The vicar insisted upon a short prayer which Ginny looked bemused through (having never experienced a prayer before), Mr Hall knew all of the words to, Harry thought was a little over the top and the cleaner checked her watch.

They then proceeded to a miniscule room to the left of the main part. Crammed uncomfortably inside, Harry and Ginny signed their names onto the register, trying to avoid elbowing anybody else as they did so. The witnesses scrawled their signatures alongside it.

It was all over. They were married. It had taken just twenty minutes and now they were a married couple. Neither could stop grinning, neither wanted to.

The pair said their goodbyes, thanked the vicar, cleaner and Mr Hall and left. They walked down the road again in complete silence, neither able to express their thoughts in clear sentences.

"We're married." Ginny said finally, summing everything up in just two words.

Harry nodded dumbly. "We can go back now, Gin. They can't break us up now. A marriage is a marriage. Even if this was a Muggle one. It doesn't matter now. We can go back."

Ginny grinned, "Good. I've missed them all."

"It's been a week." Harry reminded her.

"Still…" Ginny replied. "They are my family. And yours as well. You cannot honestly tell me you didn't miss them as well."

"I did." Harry admitted. "Let's go back to that awful little room and get our stuff."

"Lets." Ginny slipped her hand into his.

Harry squeezed it gently. Suddenly, his left temple throbbed with a strange pain. He'd experienced far worse but it still hurt. It disappeared as quickly as it had arrived. Harry's hand flew to his head, it felt normal.

"What's wrong?" Ginny said concern evident in her brown eyes.

"Nothing." He said, determined not to ruin this moment with tales of weird pains. He told himself that he'd imagined it and decided to think no more of it. After all, it had been so brief and he'd experienced far worse pain. It was no big deal.

Harry turned to Ginny and beamed widely. He pulled her into his arms and into a kiss – their first kiss as a married couple. It was an oddly perfect moment, the two of them wearing old clothes, kissing in the street in the middle of a strange village away from anybody they knew and any magical folk.

They could go home now. They could be together always. No one could break them up. After all, she was his wife – Mrs Ginny Potter.

**A/N: They're finally married! That was a traditional Christian marriage service, sort of. I missed bits out because I thought they were a bit boring and the wedding was supposed to be very spontaenous so they wouldn't have time to get rings or anything, I think it covers the basics though.**

**Please do keep reading and reviewing! Reviews really do make my day so keep them coming. Also, keep requesting, I do take all requests and I will write them all at some point!**

**Thanks x**


	40. Blaise and Hermione 4

**A/N: A very requested Blaise and Hermione as asked for by: Nikki Diamond, Selesteant, christy86, MidnightRosexx, tamara72, FreckledFerret, StarsInTheSky123, RainGypsy and Danooli. Hope you enjoy it.**

**This is pretty long, it also includes some of the details of the law. A few people said they didn't understand how the arrangements would work – well here they are as told by Hermione.**

**Disclaimer: Harry Potter does not belong to me.**

Blaise x Hermione  
Hogwarts

Hermione wandered miserably up the train corridor. Rain cried rivers down the small windows. It was growing darker outside as dusk set in. The lights from the train seemed to brighten against the darkened backdrop. Younger students screamed and laughed together happily, swapping stories of their extended holiday and revelling gleefully in stories of their older brothers and sisters, now married.

She was still a Prefect, she reminded herself. She still had to set an example to the rest of the school. Even if she did just want to yell at them all to shut the hell up. Or, alternatively, break down and cry until it was all better again. She wished she was younger. Much younger. This was new for her. She'd spent most of her life wishing she was older. A lot older. She'd always acted older than her years, disapproved of her peers who always seemed so childish and immature. She was different, she'd thought with some pride, she was a grown up.

Now she just wanted to be a kid again, if she had been younger then this would never have happened to her. If she had been younger, she might be able to be happy again. She might have been able to meet the boy of her dreams and fall head over heels in love with him and get married and have lots of beautiful, intelligent children.

This was a distant dream now. A fantasy, even, after all, she was a married woman now. She would never be able to fall in love.

She wanted to scream. Loudly. She'd never been one for screaming or excessive noise, even as a tiny baby she had rarely cried. Now it was all different. Her life would never be the same again. Screaming did not seem like a pointless and crude activity any more.

She reached the Slytherin carriage. It was filled to the brim with the offspring of Death Eaters. She couldn't see Blaise there. She didn't care. She knew he would be in there somewhere, mingling with the rest of them. The mere thought of him increased the urge to scream.

She walked past hastily, keeping her head down and averting her gaze. Three carriages along were the rest of her friends – Ron was there, along with Padma, she was his wife now. They were a real couple nowadays though; Hermione found it a bit awkward to be with them. It wasn't that they were a sickly sweet couple, like Seamus and Parvati for instance, or that they were constantly draped over one another, like Fred and Angelina, it was just that they really did seem to like one another. Hermione always felt like they would just rather she wasn't there. It probably wasn't true – she got on very well with Padma and she and Ron had been best friends for years. It was just how she felt. Alicia Spinnet was sitting in the carriage as well. Seamus and Parvati had stopped by towards the beginning of the journey and departed again a little while later still very much in the honeymoon period. Very few others were coming back; people were finding it hard to go back to Hogwarts. It was understandable, the castle held bad memories for a lot of people. Memories of the war, memories of the awful days when the Carrows reigned supreme, memories of the final battle and more recently, memories o f that day when they had discovered who they would be marrying… people couldn't find happy memories to get them to come back.

If she hadn't wanted the grades, she wouldn't have come back either. Hogwarts wasn't a sanctuary anymore, it wasn't the first place she had fitted in, it wasn't home. Not anymore.

She slid the door open silently, slipped inside and made her way to her seat. She'd chosen the window seat so that she could gaze out at the passing scenery. She had sensed that this journey was going to be lonely. In fact this whole year she was going to be lonely. Everyone else would be with their spouses. There was a new movement growing in the wizarding world – gratitude for the law. The Ministry loved it. Apparently, young wizards and witches were managing to fall in love for their spouses. They were saying that the law had helped them find their soul mate, that the law had helped them to really mature and grow up. They wanted to actually thank the Ministry.

Hermione slid down a little in her seat and reached for her book next to her. She opened it at the marked page and lost herself in the words. She wasn't even really paying attention to the words; she was just trying to distract herself. As time passed she realised that she wasn't even taking the words in, that she couldn't even say what the book was about or what she had just read. She exhaled and set the book down.

"You alright, Hermione?" Padma said.

"I'm fine."

"Sure?" Ron said, peering at her anxiously. "You look a bit…pale."

Hermione nodded weakly, "I'm fine."

The pair nodded, clearly disbelieving but having obviously decided not to press the point, and engrossed themselves in their conversation again.

Alicia slid across the seat to sit directly opposite her. "Yours is tonight, isn't it?"

Hermione nodded.

She knew exactly what Alicia was talking about. The Ministry had wanted the newly married couples to actually own a bedroom chamber each so they could visit daily. Hogwarts had insisted that they had not the space and that daily visits would be a logistical nightmare. Hermione suspected that this was McGonagall talking. There had been some fierce negotiation between the two until finally a compromise had been found. McGonagall had agreed that measures would be put in place so that spouses who were not students could Floo in from wherever they were in the world to Hogwarts twice a week. The couples would meet in a newly built room just off of the Great Hall. They would then make their way down to the new bedroom chambers situated somewhere in the grounds. One of the professors would be present there and would assign each couple a chamber for the night. However, the sheer numbers of married couples meant that each couple were assigned two different nights. Either a Monday and a Wednesday or a Tuesday and Thursday. It had been agreed that Friday would be a free night and that at the weekends couples could meet up 'as they wished'. Hermione had quite firmly decided never to meet Blaise outside of the regulated times.

"Mine too." Alicia said in a low voice. "I don't know if I can, Hermione."

"Me neither."

"We don't have a choice, do we?" Alicia sounded desperate yet resigned.

Hermione shook her head. "I've done so much research. I can't find anything. There really is no way out."

Alicia moved away again, blinking back tears, and Hermione turned to stare gloomily out of the window. She spent the rest of the journey in silence. She found herself wondering where Harry and Ginny were. She missed them. It felt peculiar going off to Hogwarts without them. She hoped that wherever they were they were safe and happy. They deserved happiness.

Finally, the train chugged to a halt by the platform and the students spilled messily out of the carriages. She remained sat on the train for a while, wondering if she could just stay here and go home.

"C'mon, Hermione." A voice said suddenly. She spun around quickly – Ron. He'd waited for her. He was carrying his own bag and had slung hers over one shoulder.

"Oh, let me take that." She said reaching for her bag.

"I've got it." He said. "It's tonight isn't it? That's why you were so quiet."

"Yeah." She admitted. She was a little surprised; Ron seemed oddly perceptive at the moment. Padma was evidently good for him.

"I can't help you, Hermione. I'm sorry."

She half smiled. "'S'okay. You don't have to help me."

"I wanted to. You're my best friend. I should be able to help you out and I can't." His mouth was turned down at the corners.

She reached out and hugged him, "Thanks."

It was all that needed to be said. Eventually, they broke apart and made their way, in silence, off of the train. They were the last two off. They caught the very last carriage, both able to see the odd creatures pulling it now. Most students could now.

The carriage rattled loudly over the ridged ground. They didn't speak. There was nothing to say. They went inside and went over to the Gryffindor table. There was a marked lack of older students. The younger ones had clearly noticed their absence and had stretched out luxuriously, Ron poked a couple of arrogant looking third-years up so Hermione and he could sit.

Hermione didn't pay any attention to the Sorting, barely managing to clap on cue. Ron didn't say anything but she could feel his worried gaze on her a few times. She felt as if she should say something to alleviate his concern, but she couldn't. She didn't know what to say. She wasn't okay, she didn't like to lie.

McGonagall stood up, clad in her usual black robes, hair pinned into a severe bun as always. It was a reassuring familiarity. "Welcome back students and welcome to our new students. As you are aware, term is starting a little late this year. This means that you will need to work exceptionally hard this year to catch up on missed time." There was a collective grown from the younger students which McGonagall ignored."I want to remind all married students to remain behind after the feast. I would also like to commend them on their bravery and strength of spirit. There are not many adults out there who could deal with the burden you have been given, let alone young people such as yourselves. I have been asked to thank you all, on behalf of the Ministry, for your cooperation and tolerance in these difficult times. Now, let us feast. Enjoy." She swept her arms and food filled the plates. One first year further down the table screamed then promptly blushed furiously.

Hermione watched McGonagall sit down, defeated. She clearly did not like this law. Hermione felt sympathy for her, she liked to protect, she could not protect her students from this.

"You have to eat something." Ron pressed gently from her left.

She nodded and reached to the plate in front of her. She didn't really notice what she was eating. She wasn't hungry anyway. She hadn't been hungry for a long time. Time seemed to fly by; dessert found its way onto their plates and then the feast was over. The younger students left ushered along by harried looking professors.

Her heart suddenly began beating faster and faster. Too fast.

McGonagall stood up again, "Students, it is my duty to inform you of the arrangements put in place. Twice a week you will be required to meet up in the meeting room." She gestured to a new door on the left of the hall, "Spouses will be Flooed in here. However, we do ask that even if you both attend Hogwarts you still meet up here beforehand. You will then walk down to the bedroom chambers which are just beside the main building, before you reach the Quidditch grounds. There is a new path put in place." Her lips tightened visibly. "One of the professors will be waiting. They will assign each couple a bedroom and make a record of your entry. The Ministry apparently needs proof." She looked positively angry. "Now, I am saying, as head of this school, that it is not necessary to spend the whole night in there. If you wish to go back to your bedroom at the main school then that is perfectly acceptable. I am also required to inform you that Contraceptive spells of any type are not permitted. The use of Muggle contraceptives is also banned. There are wards in place which will detect any of these things. Now, if this is not your designated night, I ask you to return to your Common Rooms or wherever. Curfew is at ten o'clock for your year. If you are required to meet your spouse tonight, kindly proceed to the meeting room." She sat down.

Ron squeezed Hermione's shoulder gently, "I have to go now. Good luck. See you tomorrow." He turned and walked away. She saw that Padma had waited for him. They took each others' hands casually and wandered out chatting. She saw the pair turn around for one last look, she managed a small smile.

She stood up at the same time as Alicia. Alicia looked faintly grey. "Shall we?"

Alicia nodded.

They joined the group of students entering the room. It was fairly bland; seats were placed around the edges of the room so that waiting students could sit. There was also a door leading outside, it had a clear pane of glass at the top. Outside was a lit pathway disappearing to the chambers. There were four fireplaces in a neat row against the back wall.

Suddenly, one glowed green and a wizard appeared on the floor. He rose, brushed soot from his robes and strode over to a Hufflepuff who squealed and embraced him happily.

This seemed to begin the tide. The fireplaces began glowing green and witches and wizards spewed from them. Hogwarts couples tentatively edged towards each other and a few couples even began departing for the chambers. Hermione could see Blaise standing alongside a few of his friends. She didn't want to go over. It didn't look like he was coming to her any time soon.

The room was slowly clearing. The fireplaces had stuttered to a halt. A clock on the wall showed that they had been here fifteen minutes. Finally, McGonagall hurried in and asked them all to kindly depart now. Reluctantly, Blaise detached himself from his friend (who looked like he wanted to die as he walked towards Millicent Bulstrode) and strolled over to Hermione.

"C'mon then." He said, turning on his heel and striding out.

Hermione resented having to follow him but had no desire to walk beside him. She remained a few paces behind. He walked as if he owned the place. She walked as if she would rather be going in the opposite direction.

The new building was built a little like a miniature Hogwarts. Professor Sprout stood at the door clutching a clipboard and wearing a sympathetic look and her customary patched hat.

"Hurry along now, Mr Zabini, Miss Gr-, Mrs Zabini."

Hermione felt nausea rise up in her throat at her new unwelcome name. She had never wanted to be a Zabini. She didn't like Blaise, found his company overbearing, disliked everything about him. She particularly disliked the strange feelings she was having towards him. She noticed that he had very long eyelashes as Sprout wrote their names down next to the number thirty seven. That wasn't her talking, that was the law. She passed them the clipboard and both signed their names.

Sprout pointed them inside and abandoned them in a very long corridor studded liberally with identical doors each emblazoned with a large number. Silently they made their way to number thirty seven and Blaise flung the door open.

A fire roared in the grate, opulence dripped from every square centimetre, in the very centre of the room was a huge bed. There was no other furniture excluding a long velvet sofa.

Merlin.


	41. Seamus and Parvati 2

**A/N: Wow, words cannot describe how much I love you guys right now. I get back from a weekend away to find my inbox filled with lovely emails telling me I have a whole lot of lovely reviews.**

**I realise that Ron and Padma are my current most requested couple (to date something like 8 people want a chapter of them), however I fancied writing Seamus and Parvati. Sorry! This is for Pilks. Next I will write Ron and Padma or Fred and Angelina.**

**I want to say a big thank you to everyone who reviews – especially to those who review every chapter – it means so much, more than you realise. Thank you.**

**I also want to just say that a lot of people have requested HermionexBlaise, just to make it clear and to avoid disappointment, my next chapter of them will not follow on from the previous. I will not be recounting their night together, you'll just have to use your imaginations as to what happened!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. Jo Rowling does.**

Seamus x Parvati  
Hogwarts

She curled up on the seat, cat like, caught in a brief little patch of sunlight, her head in his lap. His hand reached down to stroke her hair absent mindedly. It was a moment of bliss. She smiled with sheer satisfaction.

She'd been dating Seamus even before the law had kicked in; she thought the law was a good thing. Unlike pretty much everyone else, she had supported the Law right from the very beginning. If the Law had not existed then it might have taken Seamus years to get around to proposing, it had just speeded things up.

They were going back to Hogwarts now. Hogwarts was a good place for them, it held a lot of memories. Yes, there were some awful terrible times mixed in there, but in general it held happy memories. It was where they had met. It was where they had fallen in love. It was where they had found out they had been matched. It seemed to her that Hogwarts was the setting for their whole story. Their entire relationship was set at Hogwarts.

Hogwarts was more than just a castle, more than just their school. It was like home. They did actually own their own home. Seamus had had a very small inheritance from his grandmother, awarded to him when he came of age, and they had invested it in a little flat in London. Their first home.

She'd already planned it all out, their whole lives, they would do their final year at Hogwarts and then find work, Seamus would be the main breadwinner, she might go into the beauty industry. They would live in their flat, spend their nights out with friends in clubs and pubs and restaurants, they wouldn't have a lot of money but they would have each other. Then, a few years down the line (actually, not a few, three to be exact) they would find out she was pregnant. They would instantly relocate into the countryside, possibly near her parents. They would live somewhere very pretty and idyllic. There would be fields and woods and one of those tiny, close knit communities that seem to exist only in books. Their child would soon be joined by another. She fancied one of each but this was one thing that she couldn't control. That was a little irritating. Anyway, she would give up work to be a housewife and mother. Seamus would still work. Eventually the children would go off to Hogwarts, one by one. She would spend her days joining in with local things, coffee mornings and the such. Maybe a little charity work. She might even join Muggle things, wizarding societies were always so...flashy and competitive. She would proceed this way until her children produced offspring. Seamus would retire. They would be the perfect grandparents. Eventually they would relocate somewhere smaller and closer to their children and their families. It would easier that way, they could babysit much easier, be looked after as they aged. They'd be old then. They'd age together, slowly gaining wrinkles, their hair turning silver, losing their youthful beauty. They'd still have their love though. They would be like those old couples you see on the street, hand in hand, clutching walking sticks in the other, sneaking shy smiles at each other like newly in love teenagers, although they'd been married for fifty years. They would slip away into the next life, wherever that may be, him first. She could never leave him. He wouldn't cope without her. He would have to go first; she would be more able to deal with the overwhelming loss. She could not do that to him. She would muddle along for a year, four at the most, two at the least. She might end up with great grandchildren. She would be very lonely though, she would be lost without him, her Seamus. She would slip away one night. No fuss, no drawn out death, it would be quick and painless. They would be reunited in death and would be together as always, able to watch over successive generations forever.

Perfect.

This was how her life would pan out. Surprises and spontaneity didn't even get a look in. Nothing could, or would, upset her carefully laid plans.

They were drawing near to the station now. The scenery looked a little familiar, she could recognise places. They were nearly home. She stretched luxuriantly and sat up. Seamus grinned at her, "You alright?"

She nodded a grin creeping across her face unbidden. He reached out and took her hand as the train chugged to a sluggish halt. He towed her off of the packed train, weaving amongst the rabble of students and incredibly nervous looking first years, who seemed smaller than ever, and onto one of the very first carriages. He knew she liked to be one of the first to the castle. She'd never told him. He just knew. Yet another thing she loved about him.

The first year hadn't really counted but ever since second year she had always wanted to be one of the first to arrive. It was for two reasons. Firstly, she loved to that first glimpse of the castle, finding that it was so much clearer and better when there were fewer carriages ahead and fewer squawking voices to interrupt the moment. Secondly, you were able to grab the very best seats in the Hall and therefore were able to watch everyone else arrive. This was vital for gossip sessions that evening.

Her and Lavender had always spent long nights in their dorms, huddled onto the one bed, Muffling Charms placed around it (they didn't learn how to do these until Third Year and so had spent much of the second year whispering in hushed tones). They'd discuss what everyone had been wearing, what their hair had looked like, who should not have worn plaits, who had overdone the blusher or who had eaten the most at dinner. The first night would be a topic of discussion for the entire year, judgements could be based entirely on a person's appearance, attire and manner at the dinner of the first evening. Every girl worth her salt knew this much. It would not matter if you wore your hair loose and never bothered to put a scrap of make up on for the rest of the year, if you had looked glamorous and gorgeous the first night then that reputation would hold for the full three terms. Parvati herself, of course, always put much effort into her first night and she never let her standards slip. This year she didn't know if she cared so much though, it didn't matter what she looked like, Seamus didn't mind either way. She was less shallow this year, more mature. She could see beyond the superficial. This didn't mean she wouldn't still gossip and bitch along with the rest of them, it would just be far less malicious this year.

As they turned the corner, the carriage jolted roughly and she fell off of her seat straight into Seamus who caught her hurriedly.

"Sorry." She murmured, "Stupid horses."

"You okay?" He scanned her face with concern and tenderly smoothed the hair off of her forehead. She hated it when he did this but loved it at the same time – it showed he cared. He also always managed to do this exactly when she had just finished arranging her hair.

"Yeah, I'm fine." She slipped her hand into his. His hand felt huge compared to hers. She always rather liked this fact.

The castle climbed into view, strong and solid and dependable as always. Lights shone brightly out into the dark evening sky, welcoming back the returning students. Parvati found herself smiling and feeling a weird rush of love for the old castle. It had never meant this much to her before but now, approaching her final year she realised this would be the last time she made this trip. It made her, absurdly, want to cry.

The carriages clattered to a halt, Seamus assisted her down and they wandered into the entrance hall. Professor Flitwick stood by the doorway, grinning happily, and greeting the students. A very few students, Hufflepuffs by the looks of them, were just approaching the door. Excellent, they were some of the first.

"Hello Mr Finnigan! Mrs Finnigan!" Flitwick sung merrily as they passed by. Both nodded at him, exchanged secretive smiles at her new name. The rush of happiness she felt at hearing his surname attached to her own name never seemed to dim no matter how many times she heard it. She hoped it never did.

Safely ensconced in her favourite seat, Parvati leaned against Seamus' shoulder and turned to survey the flood of students pouring into the hall. She noted that Eloise Midgen's acne had returned with vengeance and that Ernie MacMillan was wearing the Head Boy badge very proudly on his puffed out chest. She saw that Hermione Granger had come back for her final year, looked very pale and as if she were about to cry and that she entered late with Ronald Weasley. She watched as Katie Bell entered the Hall alone, looking bereft without her usual gaggle of friends and wearing her hair in a very unflattering ponytail which did nothing for her rather prominent ears. Lavender was not returning this year but Parvati still had Padma and Cho to talk with. It would be unusual not having her best friend about, although her and Lavender were at that awkward stage of friendship where one person is beginning to move on. But, this year she had her Seamus. She would not be lonely.

Lavender had been her best friend for years. She was technically responsible for setting her and Seamus up. But Lavender had changed. Fame, through the rather meagre claim of being engaged to Harry Potter, had turned her head and hardened her heart. Parvati thought it a little pathetic as Lavender did everything she could in order to prolong her five minutes of fame. She wasn't even returning to Hogwarts because, "The public would miss me. I need to stay in the public eye." Lavender was still her best friend, of course, but Parvati had other things to do rather than follow Lavender's every lead. She was beginning to grow out of their friendship.

McGonagall rose and made her customary speech, Parvati found herself zoning out entirely. The first years were sorted, she clapped just about on cue but paid no real attention. Normally she would be listening and watching attentively, keen to see who would be joining her house. This year she wasn't that bothered. She didn't feel quite right. Her head ached.

The food appeared magically on the tables. The house elves had really outdone themselves: juicy chickens, sizzling sausages, creamy mashed potatoes, crisp vegetables, a huge joint of beef, food covered the entire tabletop. A first year screamed in terror at the food's sudden appearance and promptly turned beet red and every head in the hall turned to stare at her.

Parvati reached for the roast potatoes – her favourites- and promptly pulled back. A sudden wave of nausea had hit her. She suddenly didn't want the potatoes, which usually she would be prepared to fight tooth and nail for, or indeed anything. She squeezed her eyes tight shut and tried to concentrate on something other than the smell of the food. Everything seemed enhanced somehow, every scent stronger, more overpowering. It made her stomach turn queasily.

Seamus turned to her, "What's wrong?"

"Just don't feel right." She said, not opening her eyes.

"Do you want to get some air?"

"No. I'll be fine. Honest." She managed to open her eyes and smile reassuringly at him. She didn't want to worry him, she was fine, just feeling a little sick. It had been a long day. There was nothing wrong. He nodded, evidently mollified and turned back to his food and a long winded Quidditch conversation with Ron. She noted that Hermione wasn't eating much either.

Slowly, the nausea began to vanish and her head cleared. The headmistress stood to dismiss them. Unfortunately, the married couples were asked to stay behind on this night of all nights when all she wanted to do was go to the common room. Worse news was that they had not been assigned tonight in the bedroom chambers. Tonight they would be sleeping in separate beds for the first time since the wedding.

When McGonagall finally dismissed them, she and Seamus wandered back to the common room surrounded by some of their friends, chatting lightly. His arm was wrapped tightly around her waist.

Everything was just perfect.


	42. Ron and Padma 4

**A/N: Sorry for the late update – I thought that half term would equal lots of writing time but it really didn't. I don't have much time to write anymore, a combination of school and suddenly getting a life have eaten up all my spare time. I am trying to update regularly though as well as writing new stuff.**

**This is a Ron and Padma chapter for FaithfulHPReader, Bergere, tamara72, gWeasley77, Bergere, isolemnlyswearthatiamup2nogood and lovenotwarXo. **

**Please keep reviewing and requesting! I do listen to all requests and eventually I do get around to writing them!**

**Disclaimer: I never have and never will own Harry Potter.**

Ron x Padma  
Hogwarts

He knew full well that he wasn't a catch. Not like Harry, Harry had that whole Chosen-One-Wizarding-hero-tortured-soul thing that made girls practically fall at his feet. Not like Hermione, Hermione had that brainy chick thing that was sort of hot, in a weird way. He was just the dud of the lot. The sidekick if you like. The one that, really, they didn't need. They probably could have saved the world without him really. These sorts of things always sounded better as a trio though, made a better story.

He knew that he was impatient and incredibly tactless. He just pretended to himself, and to everyone else, that he didn't realise this about himself. After all, no one wants to be confronted with the very worst things about themselves. He didn't realise how tactless he had been until afterwards, when it was too late to do anything about it. He didn't actually mean to say the wrong things at precisely the wrong times, he couldn't help it.

He also knew that he was quite possibly in love with Padma Patil.

Now that, that was a real surprise. No one had ever anticipated that, let alone him. For a while he had toyed with the idea of loving Hermione. It would have been a nice story. Two of the trio falling in love. It hadn't been real love or particularly lasting. It was like puppy love. The sort that means nothing now, but at the time was all consuming. He thought that it might have been something to do with besting Harry. Childish and silly really, pathetic definitely. But in his jealousy ridden mind, getting Hermione would be scoring one up on Harry. It wasn't malicious or anything. Harry was his best mate, after all, he was always pleased for Harry. He just would have quite liked to beat him in something just once.

Of course, it had turned out that Harry had never even liked Hermione like that, looked on her as a sister, that was all. It had also transpired that Ron didn't like Hermione like that either. He loved Hermione like he loved...Ginny.

He'd fallen instantly in lust with Lavender Brown. Beautiful, blonde Lavender. It was easy now to recognise why he had liked her. She was beautiful and lovely and desirable - she was the sort of girl that should like Harry and yet...she'd liked him, Ron. She gave him attention, the sort of attention he'd always craved and had never recieved. She was very different to how he'd expected. He'd seen what everyone else had seen - a little shallow, a bit of an airhead, not that bright. She wasn't like that at all. She was actually very quick witted, far more intelligent that she let on and incredibly sarcastic at time. Of course, that liaison had run its course, ending horribly when he became bored, as most adolescent males do, with her clinginess and possessive jealousy.

That was the extent of his forays into the world of love. Now things were different. He'd made the final journey and found Padma.

She was just right for him really. That was unexpected. She was supposed to be dull and bookish, like Hermione only more boring. She wasn't. She was supposed to be standoffish and conceited. She wasn't. She was supposed to hate his family and be excluded, an outsider. She wasn't.

She was intelligent but not overly so. She was down to earth and refreshingly normal. She made fun of him when she thought he was getting too big for his boots. She bellowed with laughter when Fred and George played pranks on her. She knew loads about Muggle stuff and spent hours explaining to his Dad exactly how Muggle things worked. She loved his Mum and Molly loved her to. She could talk politics with Percy. She was an exceptional poker player and won twenty Galleons off of the twins, notorious for their poker playing talents. She was practically best friends with Hermione. She played endless games of peek-a-boo with baby Teddy. She flattered a very pregnant Fleur, who seemed less depressed these days even though her stomach was larger than ever. She just fitted in seamlessly with the Weasley clan. She could be one of them, she was one of them.

At the initial Ministry meeting, he'd hated her. She'd been rude and irritating and condescending. He'd been even ruder, boorish and arrogant.

At the first Weasley dinner, he'd pretty much ignored her. She'd been unwelcome, excluded and overwhelmed. He'd been cold, distant, smirking and so rude.

At the successive Weasley dinners, he'd realised she wasn't all that bad. She'd been witty and amusing and one of the family. He'd been teasing and joking and...impressed.

At their first kiss, he'd begun to appreciate how amazing she was. She'd been forward, made the first move and slipped her hand into his afterwards. He'd been quiet and secretly thrilled.

At their wedding, held in early September, he'd realised exactly how head over heels in love with her he was. She'd been utterly, heartbreakingly beautiful, shy and bashfully smiley. He'd been awed and a little lovestruck.

At their honeymoon, he'd finally told her. She'd grinned stupidly and said it back. He'd whooped loudly, spun her up into his arms, kissed her soundly and then thrown her into the hotel pool.

They were just meant to be.

They were off to Hogwarts this year. The two of them, together. It would be the first time, well, not the first but the first time _together_. It would be different, very different because Harry wouldn't be there. It would be odd without him there.

Harry had eloped, disappeared, ran off. With his, Ron's, baby sister. That was…he wasn't quite sure. Part of him wanted to rip Harry limb for limb for loving his baby sister, part of him wanted to cheer their sheer daring at disregarding the Ministry, part of him wanted to be happy that his best mate had found someone, that his baby sister had found someone and ignore the fact that they'd found their someones in each other.

It was true love between them. Any fool could see that. If they were happy, then he could probably live with that. He just wished they'd hurry up and get their arses back home. He missed them both. He'd missed joking with Harry, just talking to Harry, playing Quidditch, talking Quidditch. He'd missed teasing his little sister and even having her tease him back.

Hogwarts was going to be very different this year. He hadn't wanted to even come back. Harry had attempted to persuade him to and then his Mum had overhead and thrown a huge fit over it and he'd finally given in. He'd been tempted to just pack it all in, give up education and just see where he went. It would be spontaneous, free, adventurous. He'd travel a bit, stay with Charlie maybe, get a part time job with the twins for a bit, just do what he wanted.

Of course he soon dismissed this idea. It wasn't what he really wanted to do. He told himself he liked the idea but he didn't. He didn't want to do that. He just didn't want to go back to the castle and he'd do everything he could to avoid it.

He'd been back plenty of times since the War. He'd helped in the restoration, been part of the small army enlisted to help clear, rebuild and refurbish the place. He'd gone to every single funeral of every single person killed in the battle, most had been buried in the grounds. He'd attended the memorial service held at the castle. He'd helped, along with Harry and Hermione, to unveil the new commemoration stone at the service. He'd even begun school again. McGonagall had reopened the school for the last half term.

But the prolonged absence had changed things. He could no longer pretend that nothing had happened or that he wasn't really at Hogwarts. The memories were back. Back with vengeance.

He'd never ever thought of himself as a weak person. But these nightmares, well...they weren't exactly brave where they?

They were scary, terrifying, awful. Night after night he'd wake drenched in cold sweat, bedclothes twisted up around his waist, hair sticking out wildly, eyes petrified. The dream would start off well enough – he'd be at the castle, laughing with his friends, just an average sort of school day. It would change suddenly. The sky would darken dramatically and he'd hear laughter. Terrible laughter. There would be screaming, terrified students running to hide and the bravest and most sensible drawing wands. And then, Death Eaters would fly out of nowhere, cloaked in black, faces masked. The Battle would start.

Curses flew haphazardly across the small space, hitting the walls and making bricks tumble messily to the floor. Laughter, manic laughter, echoed around. Bodies fell to the floor like a puppet whose strings had been cut.

He'd go to the side of one fallen body, check for a pulse before finally looking at the face, and see Hermione. He'd turn to scream for help just as Harry fell by his side, glasses cracked. Scramble over desperately to his side, just as his Dad fell to the ground. His Mum. Fred. Percy. Bill. George. Charlie. Ginny. All gone.

After the wedding the nightmares suddenly stopped. It was as if her presence, Padma's, caused the awful dreams to disappear.

That was just another reason to love her – release from the dreams that had plagued him night after night.

He turned to Padma, sitting on the uncomfortable train seats to his left and grinned. She smiled back.

"You okay?" She said.

He nodded. "I'm fine. Just...tired."

"Me too." She looked over worriedly at Hermione and mouthed silently at him, "Think she's okay?"

He shook his head. "Hers is tonight." He mouthed back. Padma's eyes widened in sympathy and she nodded.

"Looking forward to going back?" He asked out loud now.

She shook her head. "I'm...I'm scared." She said very quietly in an almost whisper.

He wrapped a long arm around her and pulled her close. She buried her face against his shoulder, tears leaking from her dark eyes. He tightened his grip on her. He heard her sniff loudly. He leaned his face close, his freckled cheek against her hair. "Me too." He admitted in a barely audible tone. "I'm so scared."


	43. Blaise and Hermione 5

**A/N: A Blaise and Hermione chapter for Danooli, Whisperheart, MidnightRosexx, RainGypsy, gWeasley77 and Dumbledore's Mum. **

**This is intended to carry on from my last Blaise and Hermione chapter.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own any part, or whole, of Harry Potter.**

Blaise x Hermione  
Hogwarts Bedroom Chambers

She walked out; still tugging her clothes straight and closed the door gently behind her. She felt sick to her stomach. She couldn't believe what she had just done. It was sick. It was wrong. It was horrible.

The corridor seemed to be almost laughing at her, the many doors mocking her. She almost ran down the hall, wishing that it wasn't so long, that it would just end, wishing she could just get out, get out of here, get free. The end doors were closed but they opened as she approached. A little like Muggle sliding doors, she found herself wondering whether they had been copied from the Muggles. She couldn't quite believe what she had just done.

She felt dirty and used and unclean. She didn't feel like herself anymore. She didn't feel like Hermione Granger, bookworm, know it all, best friend of Harry Potter, the Chosen One, and Ronald Weasley, his sidekick.

Blaise was not a gentle sort of person. She had sort of hoped that beneath his hard, arrogant, dark exterior, she would find that he really wasn't all that bad. She hadn't. What she saw on the outside was not a mask, it was him. They were not an evenly matched sort of couple. Every movement, every touch had been oddly disjointed. She knew exactly what the problem was - it was the contrast between her own feelings and the charms acting upon them.

Hermione wanted to pull back, grab her clothes and run and run and run until she couldn't see Blaise anymore. The charms wanted her to reach out and touch. The charms had won out.

It was awful. Truly honestly awful.

It hadn't been an act of love, nothing of the sort. It had been quick, hasty, fulfilling a necessary duty. There had been no build up. No whispered words of love or heated kisses. It had been basic and primitive.

The grounds were cold and quiet. They didn't seem welcoming or homely anymore. The castle didn't feel like a sanctuary to her. It had been the first place she had honestly fitted in.

But now, the bad memories had overtaken the good, poisoned them with awful images and pictures and she would never be able to see Hogwarts the same way again. It would never be home for her.

The Law had ruined it for her. The Law had wrecked her future. The Law had destroyed her life.

In a sudden fit of rebellion, she stepped off of the clearly designated path and padded silently over the dewy damp grass. The moisture dampened and darkened the end of her shoes. She didn't care; she didn't care about anything at all at the moment.

She'd never really gone out of bounds before. Well, never just because she could. She'd justified her rule breaking with the knowledge that she was merely helping to prevent the evillest wizard of all time returning to power.

She wasn't sure if this was technically out of bounds. Legally she was an adult now, Hogwarts had no real influence over her. She wasn't even sure she wanted to be here anymore, not sure that she cared about her reputation, about what teachers thought of her, about her education.

The Lake glinted softly in the moonlight. It looked more welcoming now in the dark than it usually did by day. The surface was glass like, smooth, unruffled. There was no hint of breeze.

She crossed to the Lake's edge and sat down, the damp soaking through the thin fabric of her school skirt instantly. It was cold, freezing but couldn't be bothered to move. She didn't want to move. She couldnt go back to the dormitory just yet. She didn't think sleep would be a release anymore. In her dreams, she would just see what she had done, played out over and over.

She would just stay out here a while, it would be a comfort. She could clear her mind and then go back ready to sleep. Or she could just stay out here all night, she hadn't quite decided yet.

A sort of stillness descended over her. The moonlight tinted her skin with a hint of unearthly silver. It felt right to be here. Hogwarts didn't feel so alien anymore. Granted it didn't feel much like the safe haven it had been in her teenage years, now it felt more…she wasn't sure how to describe it.

The bedroom chambers were out of sight now, hidden by a thick clump of fir trees. It made her feel slightly better not being able to see the place. It was a sort of relief. The chambers had instantly become her least favourite place, a hated place.

The world seemed a little alien to her. A foreign place.

Everything seemed different now. She found herself reminiscing about her younger years. Why had she not been happier, more positive, laughed more, enjoyed life? She had never realised quite how lucky she really was. Why had she wasted her time in books instead of really living?

She wouldn't be able to live now. Not properly. Aristocratic Purebloods insisted that their women had far more chances and opportunities than those who were half bloods or Muggleborn or had less money. They lied. Pureblood women had no chances at life.

So yes, they had money. So yes, they didn't have to work. So yes, they usually looked incredibly beautiful. But they were limited in what they could do.

Her life would be very limited now. Blaise, and his awful mother, had made it pretty clear that she wouldn't be working. They'd insisted that Zabini brides did not work. People would talk if she had a job. And anyway, they'd said, it wasn't like she needed the money. If she wanted something to do then she could enter into Pureblood society. That would take up all of her time if she wanted to do it properly. She had neither the need, nor the time, to work, they'd said.

She had no independence anymore. That was tough for her to deal with. Her independence was something she had always valued highly. She always thought of herself a strong person, but now it was as if the fight had left her.

She realised suddenly exactly how cold she was. Too cold. She shivered involuntarily and drew her arms around herself. She was still clad in her school uniform, it offered little protection against the frigid night air.

She gazed absent mindedly into the dark depths of the Lake. It looked serene out there, a sort of calm in this screaming craziness she couldn't escape from. She'd never been in the Lake before. Sometimes in the summertime students would cast Heating Charms (very necessary to deal with the icy temperature) around themselves and jump in. Sometimes people would get thrown in – usually squealing girls by boys, showing off in front of their friends. Luckily, Hermione had managed to escape this treatment. She'd heard that it was absolutely freezing. Worse in the autumn and winter months when there was no hint of sun to take the chill away.

She rose to her feet suddenly, her mind already made up. A tiny voice screamed at her hysterically not to do this. A larger voice stomped onto the little voice.

She pulled her black jumper over her head in one swift movement, dumping in unceremoniously onto the floor. Her arms were instantly coated in goose bumps as the cold bit into them. She slipped her feet out of her sensible regulation shoes, yanking her socks off as well. She gasped slightly, in a barely audible tone, as her bare feet touched the cold earth. She unbuttoned her shirt hastily and pulled her skirt off, leaving them pooled on the ground.

She took a few steps backwards. She took a deep breath. Then, without hesitation, she ran lightly towards the Lake, leaping at the last moment and plunging with a loud splash into the dark waters.

The Lake was freezing, it held her in its glacial embrace. She didn't care though. It felt cleansing, pure against her tainted skin. She could almost feel his, Blaise's, unwelcome touches being washed away. Her mind slowly cleared a little. The sense of despair faded a little. She felt better, as if a shroud had been lifted and she could see that actually, things weren't all bad.

She wondered idly why she had never taken the time to swim in the Lake before.

_Because you are a sane person_, that little voice chimed in. It sounded amused.

She kicked her feet lazily to stay afloat. They felt heavy, like concrete. She remembered suddenly, in a moment of panic, that she hadn't cast a charm over herself and that she couldn't feel her legs properly.

She swum quickly to the side and climbed awkwardly out of the water, struggling with her cold numbed limbs. Hastily, she cast a Heating charm and then a Drying spell over herself. The sudden burst of warmth cleared her vision.

She seemed to jolt back to being Hermione. Merlin, what on earth was she doing? Looking around furtively, she prayed desperately that no one had been watching. She scrabbled for her clothes, pulling on her jumper and skirt, piling the rest up in her arms.

She ran quickly over the dew picked grass, not bothering with shoes and back onto the lit path. She turned for one last glimpse of the serene Lake. Thankfully, the path was empty. No one had seen her. She all but ran back to the castle, flying like a women possessed up the various flights of stairs, through the deserted Common Room and into the relative safety of her dormitory.


	44. Harry and Ginny 3

**A/N: A long awaited Harry and Ginny chapter for gWeasley77, grangergal101, OpenAtTheClose, The giant purple squirrel, lovenotwarXo, canis3 and x8jessica8x.**

**The Bill is an English programme. It's about the police force. It's awful.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. I also do not own The Bill.**

Harry x Ginny  
The Burrow

"We can go back now." She said suddenly, breaking the calm silence that lay over the tiny guest room. The idea had been lodged in her mind for quite some time now. She just hadn't been able to verbalise it. She just wanted to go home now.

"Yeah." Harry nodded, "Of course we can."

They'd spent nearly a month now in hiding. They'd been married nearly three weeks. They'd decided not to return for a while; they wanted to ensure their marriage was legitimate. Harry had insisted on buying Ginny a ring before they went back as well. They'd looked on it as a sort of honeymoon, slowly falling in love with the rural village and tranquil surroundings. They'd spent their days together, going for walks, having lazy picnics, exploring fields and hedgerows and tiny pathways. It had been a sort of daze, like a dream. Reality had hit now though, they had to go back. They had to resume their lives again.

"We've missed a lot." She said wistfully. "Hermione got married. Ron got married. We weren't there. And now they're back at Hogwarts without us. I'm sick of hiding."

Harry felt a jolt of guilt. His two best friends had gotten married and he hadn't been there. He'd been married and they hadn't been present. Never in a million years had he ever dreamed that the three of them wouldn't attend each other's weddings. He'd let them down and no matter what he did he would never make up for that. He should have been there. He knew that Ron would have been nervous and needed reassurance. He hadn't been there to give it. He knew that Ron would have grown to love Padma and probably would have liked to talk about it and needed someone to push him into telling her. He hadn't been there to do that. He knew that Hermione had been dreading her marriage and needed support and friendship. He hadn't been there to offer it.

"Me too, we don't have to hide now though. We can go back, whenever you like."

She crossed the room to him and slipped her hand into his. "Let's go home." She whispered fervently.

Harry nodded, closed his eyes and concentrated. They disappeared from the cramped guest house in the tiny village in the middle of the countryside. They'd finished hiding. The time had come to go home.

-

They landed on in the front garden of The Burrow and barely had time to register their surroundings before a sobbing Mrs Weasley threw herself upon them. Hastily, Harry caught her before her legs gave way.

"I'm s-so glad y-you're h-h-home!" She sniffed. "We've m-missed y-you both."

He inhaled deeply as he crossed the threshold. It smelled like home. Like warm bread, soup, Quidditch, apples, Weasley. It was home.

Molly pressed mugs of steaming tea onto them and insisted on them eating large bowls of homemade soup before they were even allowed to tell their story.

Finally, when they had been fed and watered to her satisfaction, she sat down in her favourite rocking chair (checking beforehand of course, the twins may not actually live in the house anymore but that didn't mean one should let one's guard down).

"So, where have you been? How did you avoid getting found?"

"We lived with Muggles. Well, in a Muggle village." Ginny began.

"We thought we'd be safer that way. The first place the Ministry would look would be magical places, places with witches and wizards." Harry explained.

Molly nodded. "They did." Her lips thinned. "Searched houses up and down the country, ours included. As if we would be hiding you here! Ridiculous!"

"We were married!" Ginny squealed suddenly, skipping a whole week of the story in her excitement.

Molly grinned hugely and engulfed the newlyweds in a sudden suffocating hug. "I'm so proud of you my dears!" She planted kisses on their cheeks, tears running down her face again. "So proud."

A loud crack made everyone jump. Two wizards, clad in navy robes and wearing important looking expressions, stood in the middle of the kitchen.

Molly screamed and then clasped her hands to her mouth as if in doing so she could somehow take the noise back. Harry felt a bizarre urge to laugh.

"Mr Harry James Potter. Miss Ginevra Molly Weasley. You are being taken in for question." The shorter of the two said authoritatively.

"I'm Mrs Ginevra Molly Potter actually." Ginny inserted helpfully.

The wizards pretended not to hear her. "We must ask that you come with us."

"They certainly will n-" Molly began indignantly.

Harry cut in, "Of course."

The wizards moved in and seized the forearms of each, forcibly escorting them to the Ministry.

-

Harry had been expecting something like this. It seems that the house had been watched. The Ministry would have known the second Harry and Ginny had appeared. He wondered idly what they would do. They couldn't do anything about the marriage. He smiled wryly. The Ministry would not be best pleased.

They were taken to the "Interrogation Rooms", which actually Harry suspected had been an office not one hour ago. It was empty but for a desk and three chairs. It was set out a little like a Muggle police interview room. He found himself wondering if it had actually been based on The Bill or something. The thought made him want to laugh. He suppressed the urge hastily, deciding that humour would only antagonize the situation further.

He wrapped an arm around Ginny who seemed scared. She didn't look openly scared but she was biting her bottom lip which meant she was frightened.

"S'okay." He whispered in her ear. She nodded hastily. She had been raised amongst six boys, she didn't show her fears.

The door opened and the same two wizards walked in.

"So," The shorter one said, sitting down opposite the pair. "You disobeyed the Law, broke Ministry rules set down for the good of wizards, to be together."

"Yes." Harry said. The wizard frowned. Harry realised that it had not been a question.

The taller one spoke now. He had a faint lisp. "Are you Harry James Potter?"

"Yes."

"And you," He turned to Ginny, "are you Ginevra Molly Weasley?"

"No." She said, "I'm Ginevra Molly Potter, like I said earlier."

"You were married?"

"Yes."

"When?"

"Three weeks ago."

"Where?"

"Rocklands Church, Norfolk."

"Do you have proof?"

Harry pulled the Marriage certificate from his trouser pocket (where he had been keeping it ever since their wedding) and handed it to them. They scrutinised it carefully for a full two minutes before appearing to admit that it was real.

"It is not a forgery." The tall one said.

"No. It isn't."

"You have broken Ministry Law. Do you admit this?"

"Yes." Harry said, "Technically. But, the Law states that all unmarried wizards and witches over the age of seventeen must be married. We are married. The Law doesn't say 'Harry Potter and Lavender Brown must be married'."

"You signed a contract stating that you would marry Miss Brown. And you, Ginevra, signed a contract agreeing to marry Mr Jordan. Do you deny this?"

"Look." Harry said impatiently. "We are married. You can't change that. We didn't marry Lavender or Lee, so match them. Force them to get hitched even though they don't know each other or have any feelings for each other. That's what you've done to everyone else. You've ruined our lives, our generations. Can you blame us for trying to make our lives better? Me and Ginny are in love. So we got married. Ordinarily that wouldn't be a problem, the Law, introduced just a few short months ago, is the only thing making this a problem. What do you want?"

"The Ministry cannot be seen to take no action." The shorter wizard said solemnly. "You will both be fined 200 Galleons for your law breaking. This will be published in the media as a warning to all who try to break the Law." An oddly triumphant look passed between the wizards. Harry didn't quite understand it.

"Okay." Harry said, rolling his eyes. Did they think he cared that the papers would say he'd been fined 200 Galleons? He'd been blacklisted in the papers before, it wasn't a big deal.

"You both enrolled for the last year at Hogwarts. The school year has now begun. We ask that you return to school tomorrow to avoid missing more of your education." The tall wizard said. "Thank you."

The wizards rose in synchronization and left. Ginny crumpled against Harry's side.

"I thought we were gonna get split up. I thought we'd get into trouble." She said weakly.

"Course not." Harry said, "We're married."

She inhaled shakily and pasted a smile across her face. "Yeah, we are. Let's go home." He wrapped an arm around her and she winced suddenly.

"What is it?" Harry asked, panicked.

"Nothing." Ginny said, touching a hand to her forehead in confusion. The odd pain had flickered suddenly and died just as quickly. Maybe she'd just imagined it. "Just...nothing."

-

The next day the couple left The Burrow (after prolonged goodbyes from a very teary Molly) and made their way to Hogwarts.

Harry felt an odd mixture of emotions. He yearned to see Hogwarts and his two best friends. He was scared, scared of going back and having to confront all his old memories again. He was worried about what people would say on his new wife. He was so happy to be going back with Ginny as his wife.

They stood for a long minute outside the gates. Ginny was shaking. Harry put an arm around her shoulders. The shaking subsided slowly. Neither verbalised their thoughts, they didn't need to.

The path up to Hogwarts seemed to drag on forever. The journey passed in uneasy silence. Breakfast was in full swing in the Great Hall.

They entered and paused at the doorway. A silence spread slowly over the hall as student after student noticed their presence. Students tapped each other on the shoulder, pointed, froze. Harry noticed a stunned looking Hufflepuff frozen mid bite. He looked at Ginny. She was blushing furiously, clearly unused to attention on this scale.

Amongst the silence, one person broke into applause. One solitary person amongst the mass. Suddenly, the whole room erupted. Students clapped and cheered and whistled and stamped. Ron and Hermione flew down the aisle and engulfed the pair in hugs and questions. Other Gryffindors joined them. Later, Ron would swear blind that even the teachers had been cheering along.

Ginny winced. The pain had flared up in her temples again. It was excruciating. It seemed to build up. A roaring sounded in her ears. The pain was awful. Her vision blurred. Oh Merlin... the pain. Make it stop! Make it s-

Harry caught Ginny in his arms as she fell, his voice was panicked, eyes wild with concern. "Gin! Ginny!"


	45. George and Luna 5

**A/N: A George and Luna chapter for gWeasley77, Bergere, isolemnlyswearthatiamup2nogood, LovelyRoses, fish123 and cassie glitter.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own any part of Harry Potter.**

George x Luna  
Hogwarts

He'd never felt quite like this before. The emotions, the feelings, they were all very foreign to him, alien almost.

'You're behaving like a wet mop, grow up and act like a man', had been Fred's opinion accompanied with a light smack on the head (Fred insisted that there had been no malice behind it, he was simply checking George had not been 'got by a Nargle' – George was a little amazed over the sheer quantity and diversity of things that could be put down to Nargles these days.)

His father had just raised his eyebrows, pushed his glasses further up his nose and said, "It's love, son."

His mother had made him a cup of tea with too much sugar and too much milk in it, smiled wisely and told him he was lovesick.

He wasn't lovesick. Not one bit. Lovesick was not a manly thing. Men were not lovesick. He was very rugged and manly. He was.

He just missed Luna a bit. That was all. It was only natural. They were married for Merlin's sake. He was supposed to miss her. It would be weird if he didn't. It would be more wrong if he didn't miss her, he consoled himself. Yeah, he thought, it was natural, it was normal, it was right to miss her.

Even though he'd last seen her yesterday, a snide little voice added. The voice sounded like Fred. Or Ron. Or some nasty blend of the two.

He did miss her. Quite a lot. Okay, maybe a bit more than quite a lot. They'd spent a lot of time together recently and the abrupt separation was odd. Things were very different when Luna wasn't about. Life seemed duller, less colourful, less exciting. He hadn't realised how different life was when she was about. She made him laugh, usually without meaning to. She took delight in tiny things, like a flower growing somewhere unexpected. She smiled all the time and this made him smile constantly as well. She had a completely different opinion to everyone else on every issue possible. She spouted her father's ideas and theories as if they were proven fact.

He missed her eyes which were always sparkling and wise and peaceful and excited all at once. He missed her gentle spirit and quiet manners. He missed her unusual take on things. He missed her soft voice. He missed her smile and the sound of her life.

To put it simply – he was completely, entirely, wholly, head over heels in love with her. And this simple fact had turned him into the sort of person he'd always mocked - lovesick, mopey and quite frankly, a bit wet.

Fred thought it was hilarious. Angelina thought it was worthy of mild amusement, although to be fair these days she didn't have much interest for anything that wasn't Fred. His mother thought it was 'adorable'.

It was not adorable, he had told her firmly. He was not adorable. He was incredibly masculine.

He was only being allowed into Hogwarts on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays he wasn't allowed to meet her. At the weekends he was allowed to spend both days there. The weekends were the best times, two whole uninterrupted days with Luna.

It was odd only being allowed to see her every other day. Few married couples began life like this. A surprisingly large number of couples were joining a new campaign – pro Law. They wanted the possibility for future divorce removed. They wanted the Ministry to reinforce the law at Hogwarts. They wanted the law to apply to future generations. Day after day smiling couples appeared in the papers saying that being assigned their spouses was the best thing that had ever happened to them. He sort of agreed.

Admittedly, he had seen a lot of pairings that didn't work. Hermione, who was practically his second sister, was married to Blaise sodding Zabini, a disgusting little Slytherin. Katie, one of his best friends, was married to Draco Malfoy. He had always been pro choice. He thought people should be able to make their own decisions. He knew of many couples who never met up at weekends, when all obligations were removed, he thought that was kind of sad. All those married couples out there who loathed each other and only saw each other when required to by law.

And yet, despite all of this, he thought the law had really worked out for him. He would never have found Luna otherwise. The law had helped him find love. True, honest, proper love.

He spent the days when he was allowed to go to Hogwarts in a state of acute anticipation. He could hardly wait for the days to be over. He watched the clock obsessively. Fred found it irritating, amusing and strangely sweet in equal parts.

Men were not sweet, he had reminded Fred. Fred had nodded seriously and then burst into laughter.

The other days he was bored, sluggish, weary. He just couldn't be bothered. Everything was different, dull, boring without Luna around. He just couldn't get excited about anything.

Today happened to be a Thursday and there were just a few more hours until he could be with Luna again. He was allowed to spend the whole night there. It was a little awkward at first, especially when they were surrounded by other students and teachers and spouses. It was weird all going off to the bedroom chambers together all knowing exactly what was going to happen next. They were essentially being rounded up to sleep together. They tried to make sure that it wasn't like that for them. They always sat down and spoke first; sometimes George would bring a meal with him. They made it like a proper date. It felt less seedy that way.

Other students told horror stories about their own experiences. Many people complained that it felt cheap and dirty being forced into these bedroom chambers. They wanted to go for walks on the grounds, sit down and eat together. McGonagall had insisted that no spouses were allowed to even come to the evening meal. The spouses were only allowed in during the evenings, after dinner, and they should leave before breakfast. This she was strict upon.

He checked his watch again for the fifth time in the last five minutes. Fred coughed pointedly. George blushed. The ever present Angelina smiled.

The hours seemed to drag by awfully slowly. Twice he found himself wondering if Fred had done something to the clock. Maybe time had just slowed down entirely… That was ridiculous, he told himself firmly, now concentrate on your work.

Finally, the time came to Floo over. He bid Fred and Angie goodnight. They just about managed a goodbye (they'd been making eyes at each other all afternoon – and they thought he was bad).

He checked his hair. Not that Luna would mind, or notice, what his hair looked like, but he still checked. Like always.

He was excited and nervous all at once. He felt odd when Luna wasn't there. His arms ached when she wasn't in them. His eyes constantly searched for her, even though his mind knew exactly where she was. He was always nervous about seeing her. Part of him, a silly, worrisome part, always wondered if his feelings, and more important her feelings, would change due to their seperation. He fervently hoped not. He was always wrong. The little part was always wrong. The feelings were always exactly the same, strengthened if anything.

He arrived at Hogwarts a bit early. Like always. The Hogwarts students were still eating their evening meal. He could hear the rumble of voices and snatches of laughter from the side chamber. Oliver Wood strode over and clapped him on the shoulder in greeting. "Alright mate?"

"Not too bad. You?"

Oliver pulled a face. "Not great to be honest, George. Full day of training, completely knackered to tell the truth and I had to drag myself over here in time." He tutted and shook his head.

"You don't mind though, do you? Alicia's a great girl." George wondered which man in his right mind would ever have a problem with marrying Alicia Spinnet.

"Well, she's…alright." Oliver said lamely, suddenly aware that George and Alicia were very good friends.

The doors opened then and a tide of Hogwarts students entered. Some looked nervous. Some looked bored. Some, like Luna, looked around eagerly to find their partner.

"See you around mate." George said to Oliver, already moving towards Luna. Oliver might have acknowledged his words, he might not have, George wouldn't have noticed either way.

Luna all but ran across the room towards him, flinging herself into his arms. These days she was far more forward. She didn't care what people thought. She held his hand quite publicly, kissed him in front of everyone.

He caught her and spun her around, delighting in the feel of her in his arms and the sound of her laughter. She reached up to kiss him.

"I've missed you." She mumbled against his lips.

"I've missed you too." He told her earnestly.

He found himself smiling subconsciously. He was with his Luna. Everything was just perfect.


	46. Oliver and Alicia 3

**A/N: An Oliver and Alicia chapter for FreckledFerret, FaithfulHPReader, KewlKat4, MidnightRosexx and lovenotwarXo.**

**Disclaimer: I own no part, or whole, of Harry Potter.**

Oliver x Alicia  
Hogwarts

He was talking to George Weasley when she walked in. He didn't bother to look up from his conversation to say hello or nod or even see if she'd walked in yet or not. Of course not, he never did.

It shouldn't have bothered her. She certainly didn't like her or anything. Technically, though, she was his wife and a little acknowledgement would have been nice. It hurt when guys you did like ignored you, it seemed to sting far more when you had absolutely no feelings for the boy and he still blanked you.

George managed a half nod when he saw her. She didn't mind the unenthusiastic greeting though. Everyone with half a brain cell knew that George was head over heels for Luna and when Luna was about no one else mattered to George. She was quite surprised that George had even registered her presence.

She had never ever intended to come back to Hogwarts. At the beginning of the summer, when life was still good and the future was exciting and lined with possibilities, Hogwarts had not even been a consideration. However, being married to an international Quidditch star did have its advantages, money was no longer an issue. She was not required to bring in a wage. Obviously, she would when her education was over but it was not a necessity. She had therefore decided to go back to school and retake her final year. Technically, her grades had not really been affected by the war. She just, quite truthfully, had not worked very hard. She was pretending that the impending war, rather than sheer laziness, had caused her lower than expected grades.

She approached Oliver. He looked up. "Hello." She said.

"Hi. How are you?"

"Fine, you?"

"Same." He replied.

There was a short, awkward silence. "Erm... how was your day?" Alicia asked, not especially caring what the answer would be. It worked both ways, she knew that he had no interest in anything she had to say. It made their conversation rather limited.

"Pretty good, I'm knackered from training though."

"Oh."

He hadn't asked about her day, the prat.

A silence fell. The room was beginning to empty as couples made their way down the now notorious pathway. Alicia had heard quite a few dirty jokes about said path.

She watched the faces of the people leaving the room. Some looked scared. Some looked queasy. Some looked tired. Others, looked happy – George and Luna, for example, were hand in hand and chatting away busily.

"Erm," Oliver said awkwardly, shuffling his feet, "Should we, you know..." He trailed off, evidently unable to actually phrase the words.

Alicia nodded. Best get the deed over and done with.

They walked in dead silence down the path, both walking as far away from the other as possible in the limited space. Alicia wondered if they were supposed to be talking. She was torn here – she had no desire to talk to Oliver, and he had no interest in talking to her, but she did not want to go into the bedrooms and sleep together without even having a conversation first.

She was a traditional sort of girl – sex and love were firmly linked in her mind. She did not love Oliver, therefore, how could she sleep with him? It was not right. She felt cheap afterwards.

Oliver, thankfully, never stayed the night. Once they had done what they had to, she would gather up her clothes and pull them on, ensuring to stay in one corner. He would tactfully avert his eyes, pretend like he didn't know what she was doing. She would say goodnight and then leave. Sometimes, when they left, it was only nine o'clock. She knew that the second she left Oliver also dressed and Floo-ed back home. It was never late when they finished. Alicia always went back to her rooms and had a bath. She could wash the feeling of him away and feel like she wasn't such a disgusting person. It made her feel clean again. She could go to bed and sleep and pretend like nothing had happened.

"Well, this is awkward." She said finally.

Oliver nodded. "It's irritating, isn't it?"

"Irritating? So that's how you'd describe it?" She was offended. She knew she shouldn't take it personally but it still hurt. How dare he say their time together was 'irritating'? She didn't like it anymore than he did. How dare he?

He seemed to sense the sudden change in her tone. "Oh, look… I didn't…I didn't mean it like that."

"Then what did you mean?" She said flatly.

"Nothing."

That one little word only aggravated the situation. She whirled round to face him on the pathway, standing dead still. He stopped as well.

"Nothing? Nothing? What were you going to say Oliver? We're married for Merlin's sake! Married! You think I wanted this? You think I wanted you to be the only person I'm now allowed to sleep with? This doesn't only affect you!"

His eyes grew dark and angry. "Of course I know that! I'm in the same boat as you! It wasn't my choice. I don't want this anymore than you do! You think that after a long day training I want to Floo over to England to see you?"

"No." She snapped, "I know you don't want to. But you don't have to show it!"

Oliver was confused – he didn't quite get her point. "I don't understand." He said finally.

Alicia threw her hands up in exasperation, "Of course you bloody well don't!"

"Hey, don't talk to me like that-"

"I'll talk to you how I want. After all, you treat me however you want!"

"You're taking this way too seriously. We're married but there's no...bond. It's just a name. A formality, if you like. That's it. We're nothing." His words were calculated and cold.

They had the right effect. The fight drained out of Alicia. "I know." She said in a small voice.

"Then what's your point?" Oliver persisted, perhaps a little cruelly.

"I just want a husband whom I love. I want the father of my children to be the love of my life as well. I want to have sex with someone because I want to, not because we're compelled to by law." She said weakly, her eyes closed as she spoke, painting images of the perfect life on her eyelids.

"And I just want to crash at home after practice without being forced up here."

"See, that's my point right there." Her eyes flew open. The dream shattered. This was her reality.

"Well I don't get your point." He repeated, still entirely confused. What was she getting at?

"Well I'll try and explain in a way that gets through your stupid thick skull!"

"Oh grow up. You're an adult, for Merlin's sake. Act like it!"

"Don't you see how saying something like that hurts me? I know you don't even care about my feelings but your making this marriage seem like a trial...like a chore."

"It is." Oliver said meanly.

Alicia flinched from his words. She stared at him, pleading with him silently to apologise, to take back his awful words.

Oliver merely folded his arms and pursed his lips.

"I am going back to the castle." Alicia said quietly, in a too calm tone. "I'll meet you in an hour or so. Don't fall in the Lake. Or do, whatever."

She turned on her heel and walked away.

She was angry. So angry. She'd always been a little fiery, quick to lose her temper and hot headed. She knew that. She just liked to stand up for herself. Oliver had hurt her. He'd offended her. He was cruel.

And the charms placed on her were already making a tiny part of her want to walk back towards him and go off to the chambers. Thankfully, the larger part of her mind prevailed. She hated him, loathed the mere mention of him.

She didn't want to have to go and sleep with him. Not now. Not ever. She didn't know how she would be able to do the deed without retching or slapping him or something. Well, not slapping him, she wouldn't be able to do that. The enchantments would prevent it.

She stormed back up the pathway, back through the door and into the Great Hall, not concentrating on where she was going. She knew she wasn't supposed to be back yet and if a teacher found her, they would send her back. They would have to make her go back to Oliver, it was the law. They wouldn't break the law for her; she wouldn't even expect them to. She just had to make sure she wasn't seen.

The Great Hall was empty, tables cleared, benches tucked neatly underneath. It was dim. It felt odd, unnatural. She had never before seen the room without its usual decoration of thousands of students and piles of food and assortment of professors. It looked very different when it was empty. More beautiful than usual and strangely eerie.

On instinct she looked up and saw a perfect replica of the stars outside. She sat down at the Gryffindor bench; she leaned back, found it uncomfortable and clambered onto the table. She lay across it, not caring who might still be about. She looked into the stars, watching each little sparkle against the dark backdrop. It was beautiful. She'd never been one for star gazing but this was strangely nice.

It made her feel calmer being able to stare into the distance. She took a few deep breaths. She felt a bit better now.

She sat up. She knew what she had to do next. It wouldn't be easy or nice or fun or enjoyable. Afterwards she would feel dirty and disgusting and like she'd just betrayed all of her morals. But she would do it. Then, she would come back to the dormitories, have a bath, go to bed and act like nothing had happened and like she wasn't trapped in a nightmare of sorts.


	47. Draco and Katie 6

**A/N: Draco and Katie for RainGyspy, Bergere, tamara72, gWeasley77, Lexxxx, and Emery Wright. **

**Please keep reviewing – a lot of people say update soon, I cannot update unless you tell me which couple to update on!**

**Also, I do realise that in Chapter 17 I say that Alicia was not returning to Hogwarts but in Chapter 36 she is. I confess that I actually forgot what I wrote, however I managed to explain it away in Chapter 46 – it now does make sense!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Draco x Katie  
The Malfoy Mansion

"I am not sleeping in here!" Katie shrieked angrily.

Draco sighed. "I'm not asking you to sleep in here. This is my suite. Your rooms are down the corridor. I am merely showing you them, my dear."

Katie snorted, "And why's that?"

"You live here, darling." Draco drawled, "Don't you think you should see everywhere?"

"I don't care much either way." Katie said, folding her arms.

Draco's eyebrows rose. He smirked. "Don't you like them? I'm sure you'll end up spending an awful lot of…quality time in here, darling."

"Or not."

"Katie, my flower, you can't avoid me for long. You simply cannot pretend that you are not at all attracted to me. The charms are certainly working." He winked lecherously.

She turned on her heel and swept out of his room. He honestly was disgusting. To suggest that she was attracted to him, the nerve of it…she was not. She accepted he was good looking, that couldn't be denied, but attracted…never, she had never ever been attracted to him. Never. Not one tiny bit.

Draco simply followed her out, shutting the door behind him with a peculiar amount of care, "So love, what are you going to do today?"

"Avoid you and your mother as much as possible," she smiled sweetly, her facial expression almost disguising the venom in her words.

"Oh, have fun love. I have a meeting this afternoon; however until them I am free. Why don't we go get a drink somewhere?"

"No." Katie said icily.

Draco smiled – he did love a challenge. "One drink, what's the worse that could happen?"

"It is eleven o'clock in the morning." Katie said simply, "Who drinks at this hour?"

"Me." Draco said in a tone which implied it should be obvious. "And the large majority of my friends."

"Oh you call them friends, do you? I thought they were more like…cronies, or…Death Eaters." Katie said sweetly.

Draco pretended to laugh. "Oh that is a good one my sweet. So, why don't we just skip the drink and just go back to my chamber…" He reached for the door handle.

"Let's not bother." Katie said, "I've seen it before, it's not that impressive."

Draco looked insulted, "Trust me, its impressive."

Katie scoffed, "I've seen it, Draco. I've also seen bigger." She left him struggling to find words as she disappeared into the maze of rooms and corridors.

Her favourite place was the small library. The bigger one was often used as a sort of office for Lucius, when he was home, and was still cluttered with papers and bills and letters. It was filled with serious looking tomes about law and finance and politics and all sorts of other dull topics.

The smaller library seemed to have been designed with a woman in mind. Katie had wondered if perhaps Narcissa had created it. The room was light and airy, very different from most of the rooms in the house. It had huge windows, although seeing as it was in the centre of the house, Katie had decided they must be fake; it was always sunny as well, no matter what the weather outside was like. The chairs were comfortable and elegant. There was no green in the room and no silver either. This fact alone probably would have made it her most favourite room. The books, although all written by magical folk, were similar to Muggle stories, which she had always enjoyed.

She often escaped here, spending hours reading a book or two. She could summon a House Elf and ask for a cup of tea, or hot chocolate, if she fancied it. She could even sit comfortably because Narcissa wasn't there.

Of course, she did have other things to do. Narcissa was attempting to give her elocution lessons. She had reasoned that mastering a few Pureblood airs and graces would allow her greater freedom. Once a week, Narcissa held a little gathering of her friends, and their daughters (who were mostly Katie's age and incredibly dull). They drunk tea from tiny cups and pretended to eat the delicate little treats prepared for them. They gossiped away happily, although politely of course, the whole affair was conducted with perfect politeness. Sometimes, Narcissa took her shopping. It seemed that being a Malfoy required an awful lot of new clothes. Once or twice she had even let Draco take her out for dinner simply for something to pass the time. There was no denying that she was incredibly lonely.

It occurred to her that she had not yet left the house alone. It wasn't that she had been forbidden from leaving or anything ridiculous like that. The truth was that she had nowhere to go. Alicia, her very best friend, was at Hogwarts. The twins were busy – Fred was still on honeymoon (with Angelina, her other female best friend) and George was so in love with Luna that no one else even registered in his mind. She just had nowhere to go. She had wondered about going to The Burrow, but without the twins inviting her, she hadn't felt able to just turn up. It seemed that she was stuck here, at least for a while.

"Katie!" She could hear Draco's voice faintly. She considered ignoring him but eventually decided against it.

She didn't want him to discover her 'secret' library – the house was so big, she doubted Draco ever had reason to venture into this room and she wanted to keep it that way– so she rose hurriedly, walked down the corridor, turned left and appeared before him.

"Oh, there you are." He said a little irritably, "I was looking all over for you."

She smirked, "Oh dear."

"Tonight there is a society ball. I think you should attend, my flower." And just like that, he had the upper hand again. He always did, the prat.

"N-" She began, "Okay then." She finished, surprising herself with her consent. She had planned to say no but the idea of a night of unprofitable boredom had changed her mind.

Draco smiled, "Excellent. By the way, Mother wants to see you. Something about dresses or whatever, have fun." He walked away and Katie stifled a groan.

She hated talking clothes with Narcissa. Although she already possessed a huge number of dresses (all bought by the Malfoys of course), she knew that Narcissa would judge everything she already owned to be unsuitable for such an event and would insist on shopping for something new. That would mean hours of shopping before they arrived home just in time to begin getting ready for the ball.

She had never been to a ball before. Narcissa would undoubtedly want to tell her all about balls and how they worked, what one should wear and say and do, the customs and routines, probably whilst they shopped. Unfortunately, she would probably have to listen to avoid embarrassing herself.

Narcissa was in the lounge – it seemed to be her favourite room, she was always in there.

"You wanted to see me?"

"Yes, dear." Narcissa smiled, the smile did not reach her eyes, "Did Draco invite you to the ball tonight?"

Katie nodded.

"Excellent. Now, darling, I expect that you won't have anything to wear so I think we will have to go shopping. I need something new to wear as well…are you ready?"

Katie nodded.

Narcissa pursed her lips and called for a house elf, "I shall need our cloaks please, the black ones we purchased last week."

The house elf bowed, disappeared and returned within a few seconds clutching both garments. Both women put them on and left the house.

Diagon Alley was Narcissa's shopping destination of choice. There were a few little boutiques, just off the high street, which sold exactly what she wanted. The clothes were exceptional. Katie had to admit that much. She had been bought some amazing dresses, the sort of thing a princess would wear in a fairytale book.

Narcissa entered the nearest one and was instantly ushered into a private room by an army of dressmakers. The private rooms (which Katie had not known about before becoming a Malfoy) were always lovely. They were quiet, calm, restful and sumptuous. The clothes were brought to you to try on in your own good time. You were offered refreshments. A personal assistant would, once you had the garment on, make any suggestions over colour or material (the dresses were displayed in one colour and material, you could select other choices though, many of which were made up ready in the back room) and offer to take it in if necessary.

Two hours later, Katie had a dress, Narcissa had a dress, they both had new shoes and Katie knew about most of the etiquette for a ballroom situation. She was also bored out of her skull. She wondered how Narcissa managed to hide her boredom – it wasn't like any Pureblood wife activities were exactly fun.

Still, she was going to a ball tonight, something that would never have happened to Katie Bell. Maybe being a Malfoy did have some advantages...


	48. Harry and Ginny 4

**A/N: My computer decided that it hated me and turned my original author's note into a code. Therefore, I cannot list exactly who requested this chapter but a fair few did.**

**Please keep reviewing and requesting, thanks! Also, I hate to sound like I'm moaning, but I'm getting irritated by people requesting and not saying please or thankyou! It takes two seconds to type and it's plain rude to just ask for something without being nice about it all. Miniature rant over.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Harry x Ginny  
Hogwarts

She woke up in a strange place. She could smell bleach and bandages. She could see narrow little beds, all perfectly made up. It took a moment to register her surroundings – of course; she was in the Hospital Wing. She tried to remember why she was here. She couldn't remember injuring herself. She would certainly never have come here willingly, she hated the Hospital Wing. She tried her very best to avoid it. Why on earth was she here? Harry was by her bedside, fast asleep, sitting in a chair, his head buried in his arms and resting on the edge of her bed. His face was creased with anxiety. She smiled down fondly at him.

It all came back to her in a sudden rush of images…she'd fainted. Merlin, in the Great Hall as well. She'd never live it down. She, Ginny Potter, had passed out in front of the entire school. She found herself blushing furiously already. This was probably the single most embarrassing event of her life. Merlin, the twins would have a field day, they all would...being the only girl amongst six boys had really toughened her up, she hated showing weakness. This was kind of weak. And humiliating.

Harry's eyes opened blearily and he sat up, his expression of concern changing to relief as he saw her awake, "Are you okay?" He asked frantically, his eyes scanning her anxiously for any signs of pain or illness.

"I'm fine." She said calmly. "You didn't have to stay; you could have gone back to bed."

Harry shot her a disbelieving look. "If our positions were reversed would you have stayed?"

She was forced to admit that nothing would have dragged her from his bedside not even Merlin himself. He smiled triumphantly, kissed her and quickly pulled away when Madam Pomfrey cleared her throat very loudly, having suddenly appeared by the bedside.

"So, how are you feeling?" Madam Pomfrey said sternly, pressing a cool palm to Ginny's forehead and shooting her looks of disapproval.

Ginny was still an embarrassed red. "I'm fine. Can I go now?"

Madam Pomfrey examined her suspiciously and finally nodded. "Yes you may. Come back if you feel unwell again."

Ginny nodded hastily. Her and Harry left the hospital wing, holding hands.

"I hate the hospital wing." She told him as they walked down the corridors to the Gryffindor wing.

"I know."

"It has so many…memories. Horrible memories, I can't bear it."

"Hey, it's okay. You're safe now." He squeezed her hand gently. A sudden pain made him wince; it felt like an invisible hand had squeezed his brain. He dropped her hand and massaged his temples carefully.

"What's wrong?" Ginny asked sharply.

"Nothing." Harry said, "It's gone now."

"What's happening?" Ginny whispered her face stricken.

"I don't know." Harry said grimly, "But these headaches aren't just random. Something is going on."

She was worried. No, not worried... scared. These pains were inexplicable and agonising and scary. They didn't know what caused them or how to make them stop. The unpredictability scared her the most. She didn't know what was going on. She didn't know what to do.

They made their way to the common room where they were greeted by an anxious looking Hermione and Ron.

"Are you okay?" They said in exact unison and then exchanged amused glances.

"I'm fine." Ginny sighed; she looked at the mass of people beginning to converge on them and looked at Harry pleadingly.

"Let's go outside or something." He suggested. Ginny smiled gratefully. She couldn't deal with this many people right now. She didn't want to have to face endless questions over her new husband and why she had eloped and where she had been and what had happened last night. She just needed some air and to be with the people she loved most.

They sat outside by the Great Lake, in an odd sort of circle. It was cool outside, occasional shafts of sunlight breaking through the cloud.

The conversation turned quickly to Harry and Ginny's elopement. Ron wanted to know where they had been. Hermione wanted to know every detail possible. They both wanted to know about any Ministry action taken.

Halfway through the explanation, Hermione suddenly straightened up.

"Wait a minute. I have to go to the library, do some research." She said scrambling to her feet and practically running away without a backward glance.

Ron looked bemused, "Well, someone's feeling better." It reminded him of the old days, when Hermione, him and Harry had been the trio still and Hermione had always had an explanation, just running off all the time to 'check', him and Harry left behind, entirely clueless.

Ginny looked serious, "Was she that bad?"

Ron nodded, "Mum was really worried. You were here when she went off the rails a bit and then she calmed down and just got all…depressed. She just hid away, didn't say much, didn't eat. She just looked scared all the time."

"We should have been here." Harry said fervently.

Ginny nodded, "Sorry you had to help her alone."

Ron shrugged, "Its okay. You're back now and that's all that matters."

There was a short comfortable silence; they all stretched out to bask in a sudden unexpected burst of sunshine.

Ron cut in suddenly, "I'm gonna go see where Padma is. See you guys later." He strode away.

Ginny found herself wondering if he really was going to see Padma or if he was just trying to give them some alone time. She remembered that he was her older brother and decided that he probably did just want to go and see his new wife.

"Looks like it's just us." Ginny said mischievously.

Harry nodded, "Guess so." Ginny leaned in to kiss him, Harry grinned into her lips. Quick as a flash, he tugged her into his lap.

She half shrieked with surprise, throwing her head back to laugh. Harry smiled at the sound of her carefree laughter, knowing full well how clichéd his thoughts were and not caring anyway. He loved her laugh. Actually, to be entirely honest, he loved everything about her. And now, she was his wife... his, forever and always.

Suddenly, a sharp pain flashed in Harry's head. He winced, the pain was burning. He felt a weird sense of déjà vu... it had been a very long time since Harry's scar had hurt but this felt just the same. He inhaled steadily. He was used to pain, he could deal with this. He just had to keep breathing.

His head felt like it was going to explode; pressure was building in his temples. Hurriedly, he pulled Ginny off of his lap, pressing his hands to his head and the pain died suddenly. He frowned, what was that about?

It hit him like a ton of bricks. The pain was because of him and Ginny being together. It was worse when they were touching. He didn't know what was worse; this pain or the pain of their separation.

He closed his eyes. What were they going to do? What could they do? What would happen to them now?


	49. Neville and Hannah 2

**A/N: A Neville and Hannah chapter for tamara7, Lunaclaw14, Whisperheart, Bergere and x8jessica8x.**

**Please keep reading, reviewing and requesting! Thanks.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Neville x Hannah  
St Mungo's

It wasn't until October that he mentioned the subject again. She'd been waiting a very long time wondering when he would ask again, or whether he would even ask again. She hoped he would. She liked that he felt he could lean on her. Of course, he wasn't prone to leaning on anyone much preferring the supporting role. She was his wife though, they were supposed to both take it in turns to play the one needing support and the one giving it in equal parts. That's how she thought it should work. She thought Neville felt the same.

She had debated bringing it up herself but hadn't quite managed to get around to it. Truthfully, she didn't actually want it to be mentioned. But, she was his wife, as previously stated, and this was part of his life. She was part of his life now, a pretty big part, and she had to involve herself in this other crucial part of his existence.

In the end, she hadn't needed to bring it up. He had done it for her, as he always did.

"Hannah." He had begun hesitantly one morning over breakfast.

She'd looked up from her mug of coffee and smiled without meaning to. She caught the serious look in his eyes and just knew instinctively what he would say. She nodded sombrely, "Of course I will. I'll go anywhere with you. You know that. I love you." The words were said with perhaps a little more intensity than the conversation needed. She knew that was what he needed to hear though. She knew him very well, better than he knew.

"Thanks." He smiled gratefully, "After work?"

She nodded, "Yeah, sure."

"And erm..." he paused, "Gran's probably going to come as well. Is that okay?"

She lied, "Of course." She smiled falsely; he noticed, didn't mention it but hugged her close.

"Sorry," he murmured in her ear. "Love you."

"It's fine." She lied again. "Have a good day at work. Love you too." She smiled at him, a real smile this time. He kissed her quickly and after a few seconds and a handful of Floo powder, disappeared into the fireplace.

Hannah closed her eyes for a brief second. She didn't much like Augusta. She didn't think Augusta approved of her much either. Augusta had a way of looking at her; it was akin to the look one might bestow upon a badly behaving child. She made her feel small and insignificant. Quite honestly, she didn't want to go and visit his parents either. They frightened her with their blank expressions and dead eyes. She would go though, of course she would. It was her duty to go. She would accompany him anywhere without a second thought. If he needed to do this, then she would be by his side there to hold his hand and hold him afterwards.

She had gotten a little job behind the bar at the Leaky Cauldron. Tom was getting older and finding it much harder to cope with all the work running the bar entailed. She'd taken the post a few months ago and was only just beginning to enjoy it. Serving behind a bar didn't come naturally to her. She was shy and quiet and didn't deal well with the raucous drunks that frequented the place. She was getting used to it though. She could pull a pint now like a proper barmaid. She knew how to mix up all those odd cocktail drinks. She could handle the lewd wolf whistles, slightly sleazy drunken chat and had learned to laugh at some of the clients' drunken antics. The job was only meant to be a filler, a stop gap almost, until she found something better. Nothing better had arisen and she had stayed in the post. She wouldn't want it any other way.

Neville hadn't been best pleased at first. It was out of concern though, she had later realised. At the time, she had just been a little cross at what she perceived to be his overbearing attitude. They'd argued – the first and only time they'd even so much as raised their voices to one another – and he'd stormed out. He'd returned just twenty minutes later and explained his fears to her. They'd talked it over, both apologised profusely and she'd accepted the post.

The day passed in a blur of serving drinks, taking lunch orders and ordering Tom to sit down and take a break (to which he would always respond in the negative – he was very stubborn and insisted that he was well able to deal with the work).

She arrived home a little before Neville did. He was an assistant to a greenhouse keeper. He loved it. He had always had a flair for Herbology and had no issues dealing with strange, wonderful and even dangerous plants. He had wanted to teach at Hogwarts but McGonagall had said he was a little too young at present but that a position would be offered to him in five years time.

He arrived home not long afterwards.

"Hel-lo?" He called as he appeared in the living room.

"Hey," she called, already beaming at the mere sound of his voice and all but running towards him. He caught her up and kissed her.

"I missed you." He said simply.

"Me too. Are you ready to go?"

He nodded, "Yeah, we're going to meet Gran there."

She slipped her hand into his; he tightened his grip around her waist and they Apparated to the hospital.

Even being near the place had a visible effect on him. He looked pale all of a sudden. He looked tired and drawn. He looked...scared. She hadn't often seen him truly scared. All the time they had spent in the Room of Requirement, he hadn't crumbled very often. He'd stayed strong and comforted those who needed it, never allowing himself to get upset or worried or to feel fear.

She hadn't had time, or the emotional capability, to worry about it when it was actually happening. Now she worried about him. It wasn't healthy to keep all of this bottled up. Sometimes you had to let go and cry and scream and feel fear. Only then could you truly move on. A lot had happened to Neville and he never broke or let things out, she knew one day something awful would happen and everything would come pouring out. That would be a grim day, an awful day and the day that he began to move on. She feared it and longed for it in equal measure.

He held her hand too tightly but she made no complaint even when her hand was bone white from his grip. He needed her and she would be his support.

He towed her to the entrance where Augusta stood waiting brandishing a huge patent leather handbag. It was a new one and a vivid shade of purple.

"There you are. I've been waiting ages. Hello dear." She kissed Neville's cheek and patted Hannah on the shoulder. "Let's go." She marched into the hospital and towards the room where her daughter and son-in-law lived.

Upon arrival at the correct corridor, Augusta stopped and looked pointedly at the healer on duty until she rose and hurried over.

"You two go in," she said firmly, ushering Hannah and Neville into the room and turning on the unfortunate healer. Hannah just managed to hear Augusta say very loudly, "So, how are they today? And none of that improvement nonsense, I want the truth..." before the door closed behind them and they were inside.

Alice Longbottom was lying in her bed apparently asleep and showed no signs of their entrance disturbing her. Frank was gazing at the ceiling.

His eyes were completely black. There was nothing there – no recognition or surprise or even curiosity. He didn't even appear to be looking at anything much.

"Dad." Neville said. Frank didn't move. He didn't look over. Neville approached him carefully and laid a hand on his father's shoulder.

Hannah was struck by how frail and tiny Frank looked compared to his healthy young son. For a moment, she saw how Frank would have looked at Neville's age, how he might look now had that awful incident never occurred.

Her guilty secret, the one that would never be confessed to a living soul, not even Neville, actually concerned Frank and Alice. It was this – if she could turn back time and change one event and make it not have happened, she would not reverse her mother's death as everyone expected. She would ensure that Frank and Alice were never captured by Bellatrix Lestrange. It made her feel dirty and ashamed for even thinking such things but it was the truth. She should by rights want her mother to be alive. She did, very much. But Neville needed his parents. She had had a mother, a proper mother, for sixteen years. Neville had had proper parents for about a year and he couldn't even remember this period of time. Really, he had never had proper parents. He had never felt a mother's love or a father's pride. He deserved it more than she did. He needed his parents back more than she did. She had her father, he had no one. Of course, she couldn't actually do such a thing; she just liked to imagine every so often that it was within her power to do so.

Neville's face was deathly white as Frank continued to make no indication of any other presence in the room, let alone that of his only child. Neville's eyes were tear filled. She wondered how often his parents even knew he was there. It made her sad.

The door opened and Augusta entered loudly, Neville turned on his heel and fled out of the open door, Hannah could see tears streaming down his face. Augusta blinked at her grandson's sudden exit.

Hannah rose to follow him but Augusta caught her sleeve. "Just wait a minute."

"But, he needs me."

"I just need to talk to you a second." Augusta said firmly, "Sit." She gestured to the two chairs, one of which Hannah had just vacated. Hannah sat and Augusta settled herself in the other one.

"I know you don't like me much." Augusta began with a wry smile; Hannah dropped her gaze, ashamed. "It's fine. Not many people do." Augusta didn't seem bothered by this fact in the slightest, "I do like you though, dear. I'm just not very good at showing it." She raised a hand to silence Hannah. Hannah shut her mouth.

"I just need you to listen without comment. I need to say this and he'll be back soon and I will have lost my chance." Augusta explained. Hannah nodded demurely. "He's my grandson. He's also more than that. He's all I have left. I lost my daughter a long while ago, Neville became like my son. I know I don't often show it but...I'm incredibly proud of him. He's a good man, a brave man. But, he's had a rough time of it. He needs some help and you're the only one that can help. He needs to talk about it. All of it – his parents, the war, everything, he needs to be able to deal with it. One day I won't be here and he'll only have you. You're the only one that can help him. Please." The last word was said in a pleading, worried, frightened whisper. Augusta's face was tense and suddenly, incredibly old. She bore a brief, striking resemblance to her prematurely aged daughter.

Hannah nodded. She'd never before seen this side of Neville's formidable grandmother. This Augusta was world weary and honest and tired and pleading. "Of course I will." Hannah promised.

Augusta's face relaxed a little, it had crept into a mask of despair with her previous words. "I know you will dear. You love him. I love him as well, in my own way. He's all I've got. When I go, it'll be hard. You have to be there."

"I will be."

"Thank you." Augusta said quietly. "Go find him, take him home. Look after him, for me. And for his parents, Merlin knows they can't do it themselves."

Hannah rose and was halfway to the door.

Augusta's voice sounded again and she turned, "Hannah?"

"Yes?" She was impatient to go and find her husband. Neville needed her.

"You're a good girl. Thank you." Augusta said. She was slumped in her chair; she looked very tired and very old. Her eyes were closed and Hannah thought she was trying to hold in tears.

Tactfully, she just left the room. Augusta wouldn't want her sympathy. Augusta didn't need her, Neville did.


	50. Dean and Pansy 3

**A/N: Dean and Pansy for Whisperheart, Bergere and The giant purple squirrel. **

**IMPORTANT – Technically, this is out of chronological order. Just bear in mind that stuff that has happened in previous chapters may not have happened yet! For example, the students are not yet back at Hogwarts and some of them are not married yet.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own any part, or whole, of Harry Potter.**

Dean x Pansy  
The Ministry of Magic

The law states that if one, or both, partners raise an objection to participation in an unwanted marriage a hearing must be held before the Wizengamot to decide whether the engagement is valid and applicable. The Wizengamot has the power to dissolve any contract, magical or otherwise, if they deem the engagement to be unenforceable. The Wizengamot's decision is final.

Law originally made to allow people to escape ancient betrothal contracts

He took a deep breath. Today was the day. Today the direction his entire life would take was going to be decided upon by a bunch of old men and women whom he did not even know. Today he might escape. Today he might have to face up to a life of misery, boredom, loathing and disgust. Wow. Today was big.

He wasn't quite sure what he thought would happen yet. His ideas swung wildly between two opposing ideas. In one scenario, his preferred fantasy, the Wizengamot ruled in his favour (having been persuaded by his infallible arguments and moved almost to tears by his story of war hardship and hope of true love), he skipped off home, didn't have to marry Pansy Parkinson and a few weeks down the line, was assigned some beautiful girl whose former fiancée had jumped off a cliff or something (luckily, she hadn't been in love with the chap, she was ecstatic to be assigned Dean) and they lived happily ever after.

The more doubtful area of his brain deemed this to be unrealistic and unlikely. This part thought that the Wizengamot would just go along with what the Ministry wanted (after all, most of them were in fact Ministry employees) and order them to hurry up and get hitched already.

He wasn't sure which way it would go today. He prayed to Merlin that everything would go his way. He added in a prayer to the Muggle Christian God, and then to a few others he had learned about in enforced religious studies lessons in his Muggle schools, thinking that it wouldn't hurt. After all, who knew exactly who was in power? No one did. It was best to make a plea to everything and everyone in the hope that maybe one of them was the right person to appeal to and could smooth things out.

He grimaced – nerves didn't mix well with his system. Usually, when nervous he would just babble endlessly and irritatingly. He thought he was managing not to do so today. No, not babbling at all. He'd achieved it, nervous and serene. Yeah, he had. This was a once in a lifetime chance, hmm... chances. He'd probably missed out on a few of those, maybe he should have been more spontaneous. He'd hardly lived at all. He should have lived a bit more, you know...taken a few more chances...

His thoughts were cut off when Seamus, sat until this point silently by his side, punched his shoulder. "Stop internally babbling."

"I'm not." Dean lied.

Seamus raised his eyebrows.

"Fine." Dean muttered in a slightly sulky tone. "What if..."

"Everything will go fine." Seamus answered. "Your arguments are fool proof. They'll work."

"Thanks mate."

"Anytime, now get your butt in there and don't come out until you are officially single." Seamus chuckled, Dean mock saluted.

"Yes sir."

He took a deep breath and pushed open the door to Courtroom Ten. A plethora of witches and wizards sit on benches around the room. Kingsley Shacklebolt sat amongst them looking uncomfortable. Dean found himself wondering what the Minister actually thinks about what he has done. This move, bringing in the law, had to be completely necessary. After all, Shacklebolt has pretty much destroyed his entire career, his name, his life, in just one move. Now that had to have been a hard decision to make. Shacklebolt must have been desperate – he would have known that this would make him one of the most unpopular and disliked Ministers of Magic of all time, he would have known that he would never be re-elected to serve as Minister, he would have known he would be vilified and hated and scorned. Surprisingly, given that he loathed the man, he found himself admitting to a grudging respect for Shacklebolt.

He looked around. Parkinson was already here he noted. She was wearing all black and looked as ugly as ever. She sat next to a very thin wizard. Maybe he was her father or something. As he watched, she leaned across to the man next to her and whispered something and pointed at him. The man and Parkinson both looked up to meet his eyes. For a second, they all watched one another silently.

Then, the Minister rose to his feet and Dean sat down as far from Parkinson as was possible. This wasn't easy – they were both sitting on the same bench. Her father, or whomever he was sat awkwardly in the middle.

"Wizengamot, you have been called here today to hear the case of Mr Dean Thomas and Miss Pansy Parkinson." Kingsley began; the Wizengamot seemed to nod as one. Dean wondered if they had practiced this little sign of acknowledgement.

"Let me fill you in on the background to their case." Shacklebolt continued. "Under the recent Marriage Law, these two were matched. They both attended the initial meeting and, under no duress, signed the relevant paperwork. A week after this meeting, Mr Thomas finds a legal loophole, one which I may add no longer exists, and now here you sit. As you can probably tell, these two do not want to be married. No doubt they, with the help of Miss Parkinson's lawyer, will try to tell you that the Ministry is cold, that they want a chance at true love, that they are complete opposites and that they could never be together. In retaliation, I would like to point out every other member of their generation who has made the sacrifice the Ministry requested. Why should these two be any different? When they are married the contract will come into place and they will, eventually, fall in love. The Ministry is not evil. We are not trying to be dictators, nor do we want to make everyone unhappy. This Law is necessary as you are well aware. I ask you now to consider the points they make and to bear in mind my own arguments and come to a decision so that they can be married before they return to school." Kingsley smiled peacefully and slowly and sat down.

The Wizengamot muttered amongst themselves for a long moment. Dean couldn't tell what the general mood was. He hoped it was disdain for Kingsley's rubbish suggestions. Yeah.

The man Dean had thought was Pansy's father stood up. "My name is Mr Price and I am a lawyer hired by Miss Parkinson. When Miss Parkinson hired me, I had a great interest in this case. I personally have two daughters, both forced into marriage by this new law. One is happy. One is distraught. I have a personal stake in this case. Although Mr Thomas will be speaking for himself, some of the points I will make will apply to his own feelings. These two are not the only two rebelling against the law. The Minister attempts to make it appear that these two are the only unhappy two. He speaks lies. These two were the only ones fast enough, determined enough and intelligent enough to find a loophole. Let me tell you, if this loophole had been common knowledge, this pair would not be the only ones sitting before you."

Dean listened to the man. Although he looked like a gust of wind would blow him away, he knew what he was doing. He could practically see the Wizengamot sympathising and empathising and agreeing. That little bit about his own two daughters – genius. That played right into the hands of the parents and grandparents and perhaps great-grandparents, judging by the look of some of them, whose relatives were unhappily married. A tiny flicker of hope flared up in his mind. He squashed it carefully – he couldn't dare to get his hopes up, just in case everything all went wrong.

Price went on to make some valid points: he used the lack of liking between the pair, subtly hinted at the fact Pansy was incredibly rich with an influential father and also very cleverly said about Dean being a Muggleborn. It was amazing how he did it, what he was saying was very prejudiced, how it sounded...well, it was perfect. It sounded like he was being nice about Dean rather than being rude about his heritage. And the jury, well they were lapping it all up.

Finally, it was Dean's turn to speak. He was nervous. Butterflies, elephant butterflies, trampled his stomach lining. His hands were slick. Carefully, he got to his feet. The entire Wizengamot, as one, turned to face him. He saw sympathy on some faces and boredom on others. They weren't convinced yet, he reminded himself.

"I am here today," he began quietly. "To escape a marriage that I do not want or need. Miss Parkinson and I are about as opposite as it is possible for two humans to be. Without throwing around accusations or resorting to mud slinging, Miss Parkinson is Slytherin. Very Slytherin. I was in Gryffindor and I'd like to think that I still am. In the war, I had to go on the run. Miss Parkinson was safe at Hogwarts. There is no evidence or proof to state that she was on the wrong side and I would be a fool to say so. But, there are few who believe those who survived at Hogwarts did so because they were simply excellent liars." There were a few shocked faces but many looked understanding. "I fought for Harry. Harry and I were friends. Miss Parkinson tried to turn Harry over to He Who Must Not Be Named. I think these few facts establish how different we are. We are not supposed to be together. I now appeal to your hearts. This goes not only for me but for my whole generation. We have been betrayed by the Ministry. We fought to save the Ministry, to save the world as we know it, to be free from tyranny. We have lost people we love. We have fought for our lives. We have gained injuries and scars. Battle scars. Emotional scars. The sorts of scars that never heal just fade. We deserve a stab at happiness now. Being assigned someone to marry doesn't equal happiness. Of everyone, we deserve to fall in love. We need love. My generation needs to fall in love with the perfect person and to help each other heal. I do not think that Miss Parkinson will be that person. In fact, I know she will not. She has gained no injuries you see. She was safe. She did not fight. She lost no loved ones. We are different, opposites. The Ministry promised us partners who were suited to us. Miss Parkinson and I are not suited. We loathe one another. She is a Slytherin, I am a Gryffindor. I fought, she ran and hid. I am loyal, she would rather save herself. She lies and cheats and steals and relies on her wealth and blood status and name. Is this the woman I want to marry, to love, to bear my children? She is not. Please, I am asking you to free us from this engagement, to give us a chance at love, to give us a chance to be happy. Thank you." He sat down. He noticed that several witches in the jury were dabbing their eyes and sniffing conspicuously. One was actually sobbing. Even the men looked compassionate.

The head of the Wizengamot was an older, fairly unknown wizard. He rose to his feet. "We have heard both sides and now we will vote. All those in favour of dissolving the contract please raise your hands now..."

Dean squeezed his eyes tightly shut for a second and allowed himself to hope. This was it – freedom or Parkinson. Merlin, please please please.

**A/N: Wow - I'm 50 chapters in now and I feel some thanks are due. I would like to thank everyone who has read this and stuck with it. I would like to thank everyone who has reviewed, especially those who review regularly, because you really do make my day. I would like to thank everyone who has requested and kept the ball rolling as it were. Thank you and keep reading, reviewing and requesting.**


	51. Blaise and Hermione 6

**A/N: A Blaise and Hermione chapter for Rosiline, grangergal101, sonea91, Pilks, Bergere, Sapphirerubys , StarsInTheSky123, cullen's pet and . **

**Sapphirerubys actually requested that Hermione get a happy ending, however, this story is called Marriage, Babies and Hatred... it does need some hate in there somewhere! Sorry!**

**There is also a very slight contradiction from the previous B/H chapter, let's just imagine that Hermione went into her dorm and then went back out, for reasons unknown until you read on.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own any part of HP.  
**

Blaise x Hermione  
Hogwarts

Woah, Merlin. Now that was unexpected, very unexpected. But in a good way. Granger was a shocker. She cultivated this perfect, goody two shoes image and then went skinny dipping at midnight. Now that was one serious contradiction, the good girl and the bad girl. Nice. Now, that was the sort of girl he could quite easily fall for. Someone a bit spontaneous, fun, daring, alluring...

Of course there was the small matter of the fact that she was a filthy Mudblood with idiotic Muggles for parents. And of course the fact that everything she said made him want to vomit or strangle her and that she was utterly destroying his reputation and family name and that he positively loathed her. Still there was no denying that she was pretty alright looking.

That was the charms talking. Sometimes they cut in and made him say things about how attracted he was to her for no apparent reason. It was incredibly embarrassing. He didn't seem to be able to hate her as he used to. It made him feel funny if he talked about her in a less than pleasant way, which he often did. He felt an odd sort of tension in his head that didn't ease up until he shut up. It was infuriating, like some sort of speech censor.

Draco thought it was all hilarious. He actually had a sort of grudging respect for the girl while having to loathe her on principle. Blaise wanted to loathe her but apparently it was socially unacceptable to openly hate your wife. His mother had been very strict on that. She had told him, in no uncertain terms, that in public he was to act like he had real feelings for Hermione. He didn't have to look like he was besotted with her, but there should be some friendly affection. You are married, his mother had reminded him, and although it was done unwillingly, people will talk if you're awful to her. His family couldn't afford talk. It needed to work its way back into the wizarding world's good books again.

There had never been a direct link to You-Know-Who but people still suspected. They needed to quash those rumours once and for all and Granger, goody two shoes, Golden Trio Granger was going to help him. Unwittingly, of course. She had no idea what she was doing, of the purpose she served.

She'd probably rather lose her arm or eyesight or set fire to a pile of books than help him willingly. She hated him almost as much as he despised her.

Although, he thought, if she persisted in swimming naked then he might just change his mind....

Stop it! He rebuked himself firmly. Blasted charms kept putting words into his mouth. He didn't like her. The spells put upon them caused them to be physically attracted to one another but there was no liking between the pair. He didn't want to even get to know her, what he did know about her he didn't like. He didn't see any point in finding out even more unsavoury things about her.

His friends thought it was all a bit of a joke. They insisted that they would never deign to marry a Mudblood. Fools. They weren't thinking logically, marred as they were by their misguided loyalty to the Dark Lord. They were fools for having publicly declared themselves. They were fools who ended up with huge fines, cells in Azkaban and the utter destruction of their family name. They should have been more cautious, never openly taken sides. That way you stayed safe. That way you stayed untarnished. That way your name remained intact. Your name was everything. It must be protected at all costs.

He stood on the path, fully clothed now and blinked slowly. He still hadn't quite gotten over the shock of what he had just seen. When him and Granger were together, in those awful bedroom chambers, she was cold and distant and silent. He was torn between caring and not wanting her to react at all. One the one hand, he didn't like her and didn't want her to enjoy herself or talk to him or remain any longer than necessary. On the other, he had a reputation to uphold and it seriously dented his ego when, despite his best efforts, she remained completely silent, wore a cold mask of pain throughout and ran from him afterwards, her whole body radiating shame. She had looked very alive there as she leapt into the water. She had looked happy. He couldn't make her happy. And she would never make him happy. It was a disturbing thought, he pushed it away.

He slipped back into the shadows so she couldn't see him. She would be embarrassed if she knew anyone was watching. Sure enough, she soon slipped out of the water, her cheeks a flaming red and fled indoors. He smirked.

Who would ever guess that little Hermione Granger went skinny dipping? He wondered how many people he could tell before she found out it was him and cursed him into the next century. He thought it might be worth it to see her publicly humiliated. Draco was pretty good at counter curses and if it was incurable and he ended up in the Hospital Wing, well then he wouldn't have to enter the bedroom chambers for a while. The idea definitely had its' plus points. His lips curved upwards into a slightly mocking smile at the thought of her utter embarrassment.

He waited a few minutes until he was sure Granger would have gone back to her rooms, after all, he didn't want to bump into her, and then made his own way back to the castle. He found himself whistling quietly as he walked, feeling oddly buoyant.

As he turned the corner he could hear sobbing. He stopped. It seemed to be coming from the girl's bathroom. He spent a long minute internally debating whether he should go and investigate or just continue onwards. After all, it was nothing to do with him and it wasn't like he would be any sort of comfort to whomever it was in there. He didn't like emotional people, hated tears. But, it would be the right thing to do, a voice ,which he suspected may have been his long absent conscience, said. In a sudden fit of gallantry, he strode forward and pushed the door open, already regretting his actions as he stepped into the room.

A figure sat crumpled in the middle of the floor, clutching her stomach and sobbing. Granger. Merlin, he hadn't expected it to be her. Now he faced a real conundrum. He had been hoping it would be some homesick first year whom he could say a few comforting words to, present them with some chocolate and walk away, never to speak of the incident again. But Granger, well that presented a difficulty. He was her husband, he should probably say something...or he could just creep away and pretend he hadn't seen her...

"Go away." She said in a low fierce voice. Merlin, she'd seen him.

He ignored her words, the gallantry still running in his veins for the moment. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing." She choked out between sobs.

Blaise raised an eyebrow. Gryffindors weren't supposed to lie. That was a Slytherin attribute.

She sniffed and looked upwards. He wanted to just walk away but couldn't quite make himself turn and leave. He took a step forward. She glared at his foot and he stopped dead on the spot. He could feel the hate rolling off of her, even from this distance.

"Nothing that you need to know about." She said quietly, the sobbing had quietened now.

There was a long moment of awkward silence whilst Hermione tried to pull herself together and Blaise wondered what to say. Maybe it would be better to say nothing, he mused.

"I'm still your husband." He managed.

"No you're not." She disagreed flatly not even looking at him.

"Technically, I am. I think you should tell me what is wrong and I will see whether there is anything that could be done to rectify the situation." He found talking to her formally was the best approach. That way he didn't have to think about what he was saying, he could just say it like he was talking to house elf or something.

"Fine." She said sulkily, she got up from the floor. She smoothed her hands over her hair. Blaise wondered what the point of that little action was. Her hair was an untameable as ever. She pulled her shirt straight and squared her shoulders. For possibly the first time ever, she stared him straight in the eye. It unnerved him.

A sense of something approaching panic welled up in Blaise's stomach. Something had happened. Something awful had happened. What on earth was she going to say?

She took a deep breath and spat the words at him. "I'm pregnant."

Merlin.


	52. Oliver and Alicia 4

**A/N: I have a confession... this pairing was not my most requested, I just fancied writing them. Sorry! ****Anyway, here is an Oliver and Alicia chapter for Berger, lovenotwarXo, Chloerules4eva and annouska.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own any part, or whole, of Harry Potter.**

Oliver x Alicia  
Hogwarts

"Alicia...have you seen this?" Hermione said timidly at breakfast one morning, offering her a copy of the latest Witch Weekly.

Alicia took it, a little confused and thanked her nonetheless. Hermione Granger didn't seem like the Witch Weekly type. Alicia had always thought she was more... intelligent. And why would she want to see it? She wasn't really a Witch Weekly girl. She flicked to the first page and scanned the article; evidently Hermione wanted her to see something. It featured a huge, very posed picture of Oliver, clad in Quidditch gear, and a sneaky, slightly blurred topless shot obviously taken by some obsessed fan. She scoffed to herself and how pathetic it all was. She carefully and deliberately squashed the little internal voice that was drooling at the image of her husband's torso. The voice was stupid.

The headline read – "Oliver speaks out 'Law is stupid!'"

She had a feeling that this article was going to be awful and yet she kept reading, even whilst thinking that she should put it down.

'_Everyone's favourite Quidditch star, the gorgeous Oliver Wood tells us about his new wife, his thoughts on the new marriage law and of course all about his main love – Quidditch! _

_We met him at his bachelor pad in London, near to his training grounds. He greets us warmly and offers us drinks – we do love a gentleman! _

_Witch Weekly: So, Oliver... how are you?_

_Oliver Wood: I'm okay thank you. Yourself?_

_WW: We're fine thank you! We understand you're a married man now?_

_OW: Yes I am. Unfortunately. *laughs*_

_WW: Ooh... so, who's the lucky girl?_

_OW: She's called Alicia. _

_WW: Did you know her before the Law matched you?_

_OW: Yes, I did. I was her Quidditch captain._

_WW: Are you two very close?_

_OW: Not really. We don't get on well. We argue a lot, too different I think._

_WW: How would you describe her?_

_OW: *pause* Alicia...she's...she's great. She's a hard worker; she's gone back to Hogwarts to get some good levels. She's a good friend._

_WW: And how do you think she would describe you?_

_OW: *bitter laugh* She would say that I take my work very seriously and that I'm very...passionate._

_WW: Passionate? Ooh...we like the sound of that!_

_OW: *chuckles* I didn't mean passionate like that._

_WW: So, the question that is on everyone's mind...what do you think of the Law?_

_OW: I think it's preposterous. The Ministry has absolutely no right to dictate our lives to us. We will never find love or find the right person. We have been consigned to a lifetime of unhappiness. The Ministry has made a huge mistake, they should never have done this. They should release people from these enforced marriages and let them find true love._

_WW: We couldn't agree more. _

_OW: I just wish I'd done a Harry!_

_WW: We could have been your Ginny!_

_OW: *smiles* You just might have been, Alicia certainly isn't._

_WW: So, were you hoping to find true love?_

_OW: Of course I was. Of course the Ministry has destroyed all that by lumping us with people whom we don't even like._

_WW: Do you not like Alicia?_

_OW: *long pause*... I do, but not romantically at all. We're just friends._

_WW: Anyway, we'll let you get back to training. It's been lovely talking to you!_

_OW: Goodbye, thank you for your time._

_We leave his flat and are overcome with a sudden rush of love for the lovely, talented and very handsome Oliver Wood! Go team!"_

Idiot. Callous, rude idiot. Saying that she wasn't his true love, well... he wasn't hers. How did he think she would feel reading that? Stupid, insensitive prat! How dare he?

She jumped up and stormed from the Great Hall. She heard whispers as she went...

"_That's her!"_

"_Merlin, he was a bit harsh!"_

"_She's a great friend... they're married!"_

She wasn't even sure if she could actually hear those words or if they were just all in her head. Her head was reeling. She was angry and hurt. She was mad and tired. She was wounded and injured.

Okay, so it was just an interview and she had no feelings for him either but she'd just been publicly humiliated by the man to whom she was married. Maybe he didn't love her, but he could at least have some sort of regard for her feelings. She had thought that they were at least friends. She had obviously been mistaken. He obviously didn't care about her at all. She was just an inconvenience to him, someone he had been forced to marry and reproduce with but didn't even like, not even a little bit, not even as a mate. At school they had been friends, he had been her captain but they had always been friends. She could distinctly remember joking around with him after practice and dancing together at the celebration party when they won the school cup. It wasn't like they had been enemies or anything like that. They had always gotten on. Clearly, that friendship no longer existed.

She found herself in the Owlery, her subconscious already forming a plan before her conscious mind had quite caught up.

She flicker her wand, a flash of light erupted from the tip and a red envelope appeared in her hand. She leaned close to it and began to speak. "I can't believe what you have done, you've made me look a fool. Well, I hope you're happy, you prat! Don't bother coming to Hogwarts tonight, I won't be there to meet you. Just stay away from me! You've humiliated me in front of everyone, do you have any idea what people are saying? You've made a complete fool out of me. You're a complete ass and I can't stand the sight of you! You like me? Well, that's just great Oliver, bloody fantastic! And I'm sorry, I'm not 'your Ginny', well I've got some news for you....you're not my Harry and I loathe the very thought of you."

Rant over, she sealed the enveloped and summoned a school owl. The tawny owl took the letter in an oddly dignified fashion, for an owl.

"Oliver Wood." She told it, it clicked it's beak and soared out of the open window.

She took a deep breath. She felt better. Heaps better.

Angry, of course. But better than before, some of her anger had dissipated. She walked slowly back down the stairs and into the Great Hall.

"Alicia?" Hermione said, "Are you okay?" Hermione sat down on the bench beside her.

"I'm fine." She lied, avoiding Hermione's eyes.

Hermione nodded, clearly unconvinced but obviously not willing to push the matter further. "Okay. I'll see you around, I guess." Alicia heard her get up and leave. She felt a little guilty. Hermione had only been trying to help and she, Alicia, had just been rude to her. She'd make it up to her later, Hermione wasn't having a great time at the moment either. Maybe they could be friends.

-

Oliver frowned as the owl landed on his windowsill. A Hogwarts owl? Why was that here?

Merlin – he saw what it was carrying, a Howler! He took it, took a deep breath, nodded once and ripped the letter open. Alicia's enraged voice filled the room.

When her screams finally finished, he blinked idiotically. Merlin, he hadn't meant to offend her. The interview was just the truth, he hadn't meant her to be hurt by it. He didn't even think he'd said anything that terrible.

Maybe, he should write back and tell her that he was sorry. After all, they were married, he didn't want to have to deal with hatred and anger between them. They had once been friends, he had thought that they still were. He had thought that they were in on it together – two old friends, forced into marriage, both hating it but dealing with it together. He'd evidently been wrong.

He sat down at his desk and pulled a piece of parchment towards him.

'_Alicia,_

_I am sorry, I didn't mean for the interview to offend you. I thought you understood. I know you don't love me either but I did think we were at least friends. You know that I would never deliberately say mean things._

_I will come to Hogwarts tomorrow and leave you to be alone for today._

_Sorry again,_

_Oliver.'_

He scanned it quickly. He thought it sounded appropriate. He gave it to the owl, threw it a treat and it flew away.

-

Alicia frowned as the owl returned, bearing a letter. She didn't want a letter, she didn't want to hear what he had to say. She loathed him. Why couldn't he just leave her alone?

She snatched the letter from the owl.

Her name was written sloppily on the front. Prat. He hadn't even bothered to write nicely. A tiny voice reminded her that Oliver did actually have horrible writing. She ignored the irritating little voice. Stupid thought, betraying her, trying to make it impossible to hate him.

Well, she'd show those stupid voices. She threw the letter onto the fire and watched as it curled into ash, his words lost forever.


	53. Harry and Ginny 5

**A/N: A Harry and Ginny chapter for gWeasley77, sonea 91, lovenotwarXo, grangergal101 and SakuraHarunoGurl.**

**This is my final update before Christmas, I'm not really sure when I'll get around to writing again because I'm mega busy. Please, please keep reviewing and requesting! Thank you and I hope you all have a wonderful Christmas.**

**A little note – in the second to last chapter, it was revealed that Hermione is pregnant. She hasn't told anyone else yet, that's why none of them mention it!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own any part, or whole, of Harry Potter.**

Harry x Ginny  
Hogwarts

Ginny winced. The occasional headaches had developed ruthlessly into a constant nagging pain in her temples. Harry complained of the same thing. They both spent as much time together as possible but usually found that being together only worsened the pain. She'd blacked out one more time and he'd nearly fainted the other day. It made them both feel weak to be so helpless. They weren't the sort of people who were weak, it unnerved them. She hated being helpless. She was, by nature, strong and feisty and a fighter. The problem was there was nothing she could fight. Nothing tangible anyway.

It was a horrible situation. On the one hand, they wanted to be together as much as possible. On the other, it caused both unbearable pain to be together. They had found that the pain strengthened the longer they spent together and that it was also much worse when they were touching.

Hermione had immersed herself in research, determined to find out the cause of the pain. Both had told her a few times that she didn't have to. She had told them, quite fiercely, that she had nothing else to do and that finding the answer would make her happy and not a lot made her happy anymore. After that they had left her to it. It was true though, spending time in the library, feverishly reading books had made Hermione a whole lot happier. She smiled more, came back from her research with slightly pink cheeks and ate more than she had been recently. She was definitely happier when she was doing something. She had confided in Ginny that when she was reading she could pretend that nothing had happened and that she wasn't married or that she hated her husband. Ginny had just smiled, glad to have her old friend back.

Ginny stretched luxuriantly and looked about. Ron and Padma (who somehow always seemed to be in the Gryffindor common room, the Fat Lady seemed to be quite fond of her) were entwined on the couch talking in inaudible murmurs. She was sitting by the fire, homework in her lap. She'd been had working on it for nearly an hour now and made virtually no progress. Harry sat opposite and was similarly engrossed. She wanted to reach out and hug him. She didn't. It wasn't worth the headache.

She looked at the clock. It was nearly midnight. They had reached a pattern; the four of them would wait up until Hermione returned from the library. It meant that they were always tired but no one wanted to go to bed until they found out if Hermione had discovered a cure yet. They had watched as the common room emptied, busying themselves with homework and Quidditch plans. By about eleven, they usually dozed, their work completed.

Suddenly, the portrait hole opened and Hermione flew in, a blur of brown hair and black robes. "I've found it!" She said gleefully.

Ginny's homework slipped out of her lap with a whispering rustle as she turned to face Hermione. Harry stood up and moved closer, resting against the arm of a fat armchair. Ron and Padma untangled themselves and sat up to listen.

"It was so simple. That was what made it so hard. It was right under my nose and I never even thought about looking at it." Hermione explained. Her face was animated and she looked happy. "When the Ministry made the contracts they piled a fair few spells in there as well. Normal sort of stuff, mostly just enchantments to prevent rule breaking and the infamous attraction spell. Of course, I never thought to look at those properly because I thought the contracts weren't actually validated until the marriage took place and neither of yours actually did. Therefore, I just assumed that your contracts were invalid and that the charms weren't activated. I'd been looking at different enchantments that could have been placed on you during or after or before that interview with the Ministry. It wasn't that at all. It's one of the spells that are on the contract."

Harry blinked. Ginny was leaning so far forward on her chair she was in danger of falling off. Ron's mouth hung open unattractively. Padma's face was frozen.

"It's the adultery charms. The contracts have obviously been validated which means that as far as they know, you two are committing adultery. The contracts don't know that you two are married. They, the spells, think that you are cheating on Lavender and Lee. The pain is supposed to be a deterrent."

"So...can you get rid of them?" Harry said eagerly. He was confident in Hermione's abilities. Now they knew what was happening, what the spells where, well...they could fix it. He could be with his new wife properly, without the horrible pain.

Hermione's face fell and Harry's heart sunk along with it. "I can't do anything until I've seen the contracts and there is no way that the Ministry will allow me to see those. They'll have them well guarded, the papers keep reporting attempts by various wizards to break in and destroy theirs."

Harry squeezed his eyes tightly shut and pinched the bridge of his nose. "What's going to happen to us?"

"The pain will get worse. I don't know exactly what spell it is, that's partly why I need to see the contracts, but they usually increase in strength. It may be so that you cannot be in the same room. Sometimes they add side effects with time, like nausea or dizziness." Hermione said quietly. She sounded close to tears.

Ginny couldn't quite process it all. "You mean... we can't break the spells...we can't be together."

"I have a few ideas." Hermione continued. "I promise we'll work this out. Together."

Ron nodded hastily. "Course."

"Okay," Harry sat down and flashed a quick smile at his best friends and wife. "What are you thinking?"

"I think we should inform Professor McGonagall, she still holds a lot of influence over the Ministry. We can see if she can do anything. If she appeals, makes it be known that she knows about this...well, they may destroy the contracts. Thing is, the Ministry have done this. The contracts aren't actually activated until the marriage took place. This is no mistake. This isn't an accident. This was done deliberately, I bet that's why they didn't put you in prison or whatever. If McGonagall can't do anything behind the scenes, we can go to the Ministry and see what they say. You're a hero, Harry, we all are. They might listen to us. If none of that works..." She took a deep breath. "We go public."

"Public?" Ginny said blankly.

"Tell the media, tell the world. People will be outraged by the story, especially because it's you two. The Ministry will be inundated with calls to remove the charms or destroy the contracts. They'll be forced to take action. They will have to do something. They might say that it was all an accident, but any way they will do something."

"But... what if they don't?" Harry asked hopelessly. It was all hopeless, the Ministry was using them as an example. They had defied them, they had made fools of the Ministry and now the Ministry was getting them back. It was unlikely the Ministry would do anything. It stung a little that it was all on Kingsley's orders. Kingsley was in charge, there was no way he didn't know about this. The former Auror had been someone he had thought of as a friend. He had thought Kingsley was a good man. Perhaps, he had been mistaken. Obviously he had been mistaken.

Hermione nodded once and took a deep breath. "Well...we've broken into the Ministry before."


	54. Blaise and Hermione 7

**A/N: A very requested Blaise and Hermione chapter for gWeasley77, sapphirerubys, christie86, Elmaria's secret, SakuraHarunoGurl, Lady Eleanor Boleyn, Bergere, Whisperheart, Crazy-Obsessed-Writer52, sonea91 and FaithfulHPReader.**

**This is a continuation of the previous chapter.**

**I've just realised that Whisperheart just gave me my 500th review! I would like to thank every single person who has reviewed, especially those that do so regularly; you really do make my days better! Thank you for sticking with the story and please keep reading, reviewing and requesting.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. I do own a rather fetching Harry Potter mug though if that counts for anything...**

Blaise x Hermione  
Hogwarts

"Merlin." He managed to choke out. His mind was reeling. A rather loud voice was swearing blindly in his head. He just about managed not to shout obscenities out loud, that probably wouldn't go down well.

She continued to glare at him as if he had just murdered a kitten in front of her or something equally as heinous.

He managed to take a few steps to find the nearest wall. He slumped against it heavily and took a couple of deep breaths. He was a little unsure of what the correct etiquette was in this situation. He hated his wife and really really did not want her to be pregnant, however, it probably would be rather rude to actually say so.

"Woah." He said.

She pursed her lips angrily. Her eyebrows disappeared into her hairline. "This is all your fault!"

"My fault?" He was confused – did she not know it took two to make a baby? Maybe the Muggles didn't teach that sort of thing to their offspring. Granger was supposed to be bright though, bit of a know it all, you'd think she would have worked it out herself. He wondered if he should point it out, you know... that technically, it was both of their faults, or no one's fault. Urgh, this was so not his area of expertise. He should not have to deal with this, he was in no way equipped to deal with this horrible, Merlin awful situation.

"Yes. Yours." She sniffed miserably. He wrinkled his nose slightly in utter distaste.

Great – now the girl was talking in monosyllables. Stupid Mudblood. It suddenly dawned on him that his children, the next descendants of his family, the people to carry on the good Zabini name were going to be half-bloods. He felt slightly nauseous. Generations of his family would be turning in their graves if they knew. Everyone would know that it was he, Blaise Zabini, that had caused the pollution of the blood line. Merlin, how could he father these half-blood creatures? He could never love his children, Purebloods generally didn't, but their blood status would mean that he would never be able to have any kind of affection for them. This child, and the others which would undoubtedly follow, were completely unwanted. These children would be unloved and unwanted with parents who hated one another. He felt begrudging pity for the unborn child.

"Precisely how is this," he gestured loosely at her stomach, "my fault?" He said calmly, trying to keep courteous and respectful.

She stared at him as if he were being incredibly stupid. "How is it not your fault? You're my sodding husband. This is your child I'm carrying. Your ruddy child!" She was slightly hysterical and kept shooting furious glances at her stomach as if the foetus inside would disappear if she kept glaring at it.

Great – his wife was mentally unstable. Actually...this could work to his advantage, she could have the kid, he would put word out that she was a little unbalanced, have her taken to St Mungo's or in one of the rooms at the top of the house and he could avoid her as much as possible. People would pity him for his poor, mad wife, this could earn him points in the wizarding world. Maybe a little madness was exactly what he needed.

"It is also your child." He reminded her calmly.

"It is not!" She shrieked angrily.

"It is."

"Not."

"Oh, grow up."

"No." She retorted.

"I am leaving now. Tomorrow I will write to my mother and I expect that an announcement will be put in the paper. I leave it to you to inform whoever you wish to tell the...erm...happy news." He left quickly before she subsided into hysterics or something awful like that. He couldn't deal with overly emotional women.

Hermione slumped back down onto the floor. She was carrying Zabini spawn. She felt sick. Her whole body felt unclean. Her children wouldn't be happy and beautiful and smiling. They would be predjuiced and dark and horrible. There would be no loving maternal bond. She was struggling to even think of this child as hers. In her mind, it was just his – Blaises'. His awful mother would probably take it away from her anyway and entrust it to a nanny. She, Hermione, didn't have to actually have any contact with it. They probably wouldn't allow it anyway. She could just have it, hand it over to them and go back to her life as if nothing had happened. It would be hard and probably feel like betrayal of the worst kind but it would count as self preservation.

She managed to scrape herself off of the floor and stumble to the dormitories where she climbed into bed. She tossed and turned for what seemed like hours trying to work out the best way to reveal the news to her friends. She played through various conversations and scenarios in her head (all of which ended badly), falling asleep somewhere in the middle of this process.

The following morning she ambushed Harry, Ginny and Ron before breakfast and dragged them off to a secluded corner. She had decided to get the news out before it was revealed to them unexpectedly and the secret was weighing heavily on her shoulders, it felt like she was betraying them somehow by not telling them.

She looked at the three of them. Ron, still half asleep and looking concerned. Harry and Ginny standing as close as possible without actually touching, shooting meaningful looks at each other and occasionally getting sidetracked and staring into each other's eyes in a soppy, lovesick way for several moments. She smiled softly.

"I have some news." She said gravely. The three exchanged worried glances. It suddenly seemed to dawn on Ginny because she screamed.

"What is it, Gin?" Harry said worriedly. Hermione glared at him, the idiot, here she was in the worst situation imaginable and Ginny had just utterly upstaged her.

"Merlin, Hermione...you're not?" Ginny ignored him and addressed Hermione directly.

Hermione nodded.

Ginny flew at her and hugged her tightly. "It'll be okay. I promise. We'll be here." She said soothingly as Hermione subsided into sobs, quickly soaking the shoulder of Ginny's shirt.

Harry and Ron still looked blank.

"Erm..." Ron said quietly. "I hate to sound insensitive...but what the hell is going on?"

"She's pregnant." Ginny said matter of factly.

Ron's face drained entirely of colour. Harry's mouth moved frantically. No sound emerged. It would have been comical if it were not for the graveness of the situation.

"What am I going to do?" Hermione half whispered.

Harry suddenly seemed to gain control of himself. "Everything is going to be okay." He said authoritatively. Everyone looked at him as if he had gone mad. Hermione wanted to slap him. She didn't. That would be a little harsh, he hadn't actually done anything and he was one of her best friends. It would be unacceptable. Shame really, she really wanted to hit something very hard. The sudden violent urges surprised her. She'd never been the aggressive type.

"Crikey." Ron exclaimed.

For some obscure reason, which she would later put down to hormones, Hermione found this completely, hysterically, side splitting funny. She burst into laughter. The others stared at her with confused expressions. Suddenly, Ginny giggled and before long they were all laughing, clutching furniture and each other, tears of mirth running down their faces.

She looked around them, still in fits of chuckles, and found herself smiling at them. She didn't know what would happen, she hated what was happening but these three would be with her, and maybe, with their help, it wouldn't be quite so horrible.


	55. George and Luna 6

**A/N: George and Luna for Lunaclaw14, annouska, gWeasley77, SakuraHarunoGurl, Elmaria's secret, Lady Eleanor Boleyn, Whisperheart, goldeneyes20601 and Pilks.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

George x Luna  
Hogwarts

"I don't know." Luna said seriously, "that is quite an average name. I think it should be more exciting."

"It's a good name." George insisted, trailing his fingers absentmindedly through her hair.

"I'm not saying it isn't a good name. I am just saying that a name like that limits creativity. What if, for example, it wanted to be a great inventor, or an explorer or a researcher or a dragon tamer, well... with a name like that, it doesn't quite fit the job, does it?"

"A dragon tamer is too dangerous."

Luna smiled. "Danger is the spice of life, some avoid it like the plague and some actively seek it out."

"Back to the point, you can't go wrong with a name like John."

"John is dull though. It's very average. I think our children should have more adventurous names. We are blocking their natural creativity if we give them bland names."

"It isn't bland." George said stubbornly.

"It's not the name of a great inventor though, is it?" Luna said insistently.

George grinned wickedly. "You know, our kids could just grow up to be Ministry employees."

Luna looked disgusted. "Over my dead body. The Ministry is behind several, luckily failed, plots. My father has told me all about them. It would be incredibly dangerous for any offspring I may have to ever enter the Ministry as a profession. I would be sick with worry the whole time."

"The Ministry is not dangerous. Dad works there and so does Perce."

"I know and it's terribly dangerous for them both. I tried to explain to Percy several times all about the various dangers but he didn't take me very seriously. I wish he would. It would be horrible if something happened to him because of a plot." Luna explained worriedly.

George stifled laughter. She was very set against the Ministry, hardly surprising not very many people were pro-Ministry after the denials over You-Know-Who's comeback, bungled war and recent marriage law. The Ministry were about as hated as Death Eaters right now. Luna, however, was on a whole other level. She had stopped believing so many of her father's conspiracy plots and weird theories but anything Ministry related she believed wholly. "I doubt it will."

"But it might."

"Well, let's hope it doesn't. Anyway, we're off subject again."

"I know. Maybe there is a Wrackspurt in here. I thought I heard one earlier." Luna looked around, searching it out.

George just smiled and changed the subject. "So, we'd agreed on John then."

"No, we hadn't. What about...Carney?"

"Isn't that the name of an island? Actually... is that male or female?" George asked in a bemused fashion.

"Either. I think we could choose. Or they could. I mean it's ambiguous; you don't give a child an identity with a name like that. They can do what they choose with it. They can be whoever they want to be unhindered by a boring or too eccentric name."

"It sounds a bit...weird though. What about...Elizabeth?"

"It's too long."

"Esme?"

"No."

"Why not?"

"It's not a proper name. It's like an unfinished name. Our child would think we'd forgotten it, you know, left it half finished. The child would have an awful complex about it and I'd feel horribly guilty."

"Rebecca?" George suggested.

"Maybe. Put it on the possible list."

George nodded thoughtfully. "Roxanne?"

"That one's better, put it on the more than possible list."

"We don't have that list." George pointed out.

"Yes but the name isn't a definite but it's more than possible. We need a new column. What about boys' names?"

"Robert?"

"I had an uncle called Robert once. Or maybe he was a second cousin, I forget. Anyway, he was very straight laced, a Ministry employee. What if our child turned out like him?" Luna sounded horrified at the prospect.

George smirked. "Fine. How about Jem?"

"I think it should go on the maybe list."

"Yeah. What do you think? Which names do you like?"

"I like...Lorcan. And Coralie for a girl."

"Coralie's alright. Lorcan's a bit...out there." George said mildly.

"Maybe we could have Coraline and Jem."

"Coraline Weasley. I like it." They both found themselves smiling inanely without meaning to.

"Me too." Luna agreed, not really sure what she was agreeing to because right then George looked into her eyes and she lost all train of thought. Probably a Wrackspurt...yeah, that was it, nothing to do with the fact that when he looked at her, her bones turned to jelly, her heart fluttered like an excited schoolgirl and her brain lost all semblance of reasonable thought.

"I'm not sure about Jem Weasley though."

"I like it." She wasn't sure if she was referring to the name or the way he was looking at her. The words were just spilling from her mouth.

"Maybe it's alright then." George agreed. He was unable to say no to her even if he had wanted to. If she liked it, well then so did he.

"Yeah." It was about all she could manage.

"Are we only having the two then?"

He looked away for a few seconds and she was able to give a sensible answer. "I'm not sure. How many were you thinking?"

"Dunno, I mean... I'm a Weasley. I was raised in a big family, I don't know if I want a small one or a big one."

"Definitely not an only child though. I was an only child." She told him firmly. She had hated being an only child. She had missed out on sibling rivalry and love and the comfort that comes from having a huge family. Her children would not be like her, they would know what it was like to be part of a big family unit and be surrounded by affection and love, the sort that only comes from siblings.

"Merlin, no. Definitely not." George was appalled at the mere thought of having only one child. The poor thing, it would be all by its self. "At least two. I just think in a bigger family, some get a bit...neglected. I mean I was always alright because I had Fred. I just don't know if I can give all of them enough attention if we have a lot." George said seriously. It was true. He wanted to love his kids properly, he needed to have enough time to be with all of them and the more of them there were the harder it was.

"I think three sounds best."

"Me too. We have to think of another two names though." George sighed. It was really very late and they were still discussing various names.

"Why? We only need one."

"Yeah, but we don't know which gender it will be yet." George said.

"We don't even know if we're having a girl and a boy yet. What if we have three boys?" Luna said with a smile.

"Or three girls." George pointed out.

"Yes. I'd prefer a girl and a boy and then another boy."

"Really? I'd prefer two girls and a boy." George said mildly. He'd always had a sneaking suspicion that he would be the sort of father that melted hopelessly when confronted with a daughter. He could just see himself being the sort that doted on a daughter.

"Oh. Well, we'll have to wait and see."

"Yeah, you're not even pregnant yet." George laughed. Luna giggled as well.

"No. Maybe we are a little early."

"Best to be prepared, I think." George said decisively.

Luna stifled a yawn and nodded sleepily. "Yes. Better to be early than too late."

George wasn't fooled. He saw. "Agreed. Shall we go to sleep now? It's 2am."

"Yes. Good night, George."

"Love you." He murmured tiredly.

"You too." She said back, already half asleep. She pulled the duvet up nearly over her head, the way she always had it. George tucked his arm over her and closed his eyes, smiling inanely without even realising it.


	56. Fred and Angelina 3

**A/N: Fred and Angelina for MidnightRosexx, MioneJeanWeasley, Whisperheart, Dancequeen105, , Pilks, goldeneyes20601, BellyAndTheCODs and ShinoHina4eva.**

**I started writing this, didn't actually finish it and then entirely forgot I even had it in the first place, which says something about my memory skills I think... anyway, I found it, edited and finished it all and here it is!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Fred x Angelina  
Bahamas

"So Johnson, fancy staying in bed all day?" Fred asked leisurely, leaning back against a mountain of pillows.

"It's Weasley now." She reminded him. She had meant it to be light but she feared the playing it cool image had been lost by her huge accompanying grin.

Judging by his face, she definitely had not managed to play it cool. "Oh yes," he said, then he chuckled, leaned across and kissed her.

Her thoughts disappeared out of her ears. If anyone, at that second, had asked her what her name was, she would have been unable to answer. That was the effect he had on her. Oh yes, she, Angelina Johnson, was head over heels for one Fred Weasley. And, from the look in his eyes, she thought that his feelings might just mirror hers.

The fact that technically she was his wife had not yet sunk in. Their entire courtship had been dictated not by love or lust or anything even vaguely along those lines, in fact it had been arranged by law. Of course, it hadn't turned out so bad. In fact, it had all turned out amazingly well. Their wedding had been perfect but some of the magic had been lost when actually their entire generation was getting married as well. Their honeymoon, however, was easily the best days of her life. She didn't think life could get any better than this.

They spent long lazy mornings in bed, having breakfast brought to them in bed by the very obliging hotel staff. They read papers and laughed and talked and...well. About midday, they might venture out. Fred, she had discovered, had Weasley skin. Therefore, anything over around thirty seconds of sun exposure was enough to cause him to actually break out into flames. She found it hilarious, having dark skin meant that sun burn was an entirely alien concept. Their first morning here, they had been on the beach – she had tanned to a lovely golden brown, he had resembled a lobster. He had now learned that it was advisable put charms on his skin to stop this from happening and they spent hours at the beach, swimming in the sea, sunbathing and snoozing. About six, they would return to the hotel, shower, dress up nice and go out to dinner. They'd return, slightly tipsy (although, he drunk more than her and always seemed to be far more sober than she ever was, she suspected this was part of his plan), and fall into bed. A perfect sort of routine.

She had never been happier in her life. She had lost track of time, they could have been here a decade. In fact, she'd really like to never return home. The English climate was not her thing, the sunny tropics of the Bahamas though...perfection.

Of course, the main source of her happiness was lying beside her. Fred Weasley. Her husband and love of her life, as she watched him, he seemed to catch her gaze. He turned to face her.

"Alright love?"

She nodded, "I'm fine. I love you." The words tumbled out before she could stop them. She flushed with embarrassment wishing she hadn't said that. She was Angelina for Merlin's sake, where was her class, her dignity, her sense of self respect? She was acting like some lovesick fool.

She wasn't lovesick. She was in love. That was entirely different. Completely different.

Luckily, he just grinned wider. "I love you too Johnson."

He still called her Johnson all the while. She wished he wouldn't. He probably didn't mean too though, they'd only been married a week or so (truthfully, she wasn't entirely sure, time seemed to fly by here and whenever she tried to work out which day it was, Fred always managed to distract her) and he'd called her Johnson since forever. Maybe it would be a tricky habit to break.

She hoped he'd hurry up and break it quickly. She wasn't a Johnson anymore. She was a Weasley and incredibly happy to be one. She liked to hear her new name every now and then, it still made her smile giddily.

She was suddenly sidetracked when Fred pulled her into his arms and when he kissed her; she forgot everything and anything besides him and how much she loved him and how good his body felt pressed against hers.

It was nearly two o'clock when they finally managed to drag themselves out of bed. They emerged from their hotel room, Angelina with slightly mussed hair and a little out of breath, Fred looking like the cat that got the cream. They made their way, hand in hand, to the beach, settling themselves on towels on the golden sand. Fred had remembered to charm his skin to prevent burning therefore allowing them to stay out as long as they wanted. The beach was quiet and calm and very tranquil. The hotel led directly onto the beach and actually owned a small portion of it. Only hotel clients were allowed to use this area, meaning that there were rarely many people on it.

Angelina lay back, enjoying the warmth of the sun on her face and limbs. Fred sat down beside her. He personally disliked the sun, but Angie loved it and he could endure it for her. If it made her happy...well, then he was happy. He looked across at her, noticed she was wearing only a bikini and then tried very, very hard not to think about it. It was excruciatingly difficult. A weird mixture of the enchantments and hormones were working against him here. She opened one eye and smirked at him. He found himself blushing like an over excited school girl. He'd always been good at playing it cool. At school he had been renowned for being the cool one, enthusiastic but within reason, a little cold sometimes but certainly more in demand for being so. Now, all that had gone out of the window. He was as panicky and worried and nervous as well... as George, to tell the truth. His reputation was in tatters around him. It wasn't like he needed it though now, he had Angie. He'd give up anything for her, even his image.

"Like what you see, Weasley?" She teased obviously noticing his blatant staring.

"Yeah." He said honestly as the last vestiges of his self dignity and reputation disappeared.

She giggled and flushed a faint pink. He still liked to embarrass her sometimes, after all, he was a Weasley twin for Merlin's sake. It was practically his duty.

"So, lover, want to go for a swim?"

"Don't call me lover, that's so tacky." She said half seriously, half joking.

"Okay, blossom, honey, sweetie pie, light of my life." He said, pressing a hand to his heart in mock seriousness and adopting a sappy, lovesick face. He knew perfectly well that she found all this pet names, lovesick stuff sickening. In his mind that equalled four word – all the more reason.

Internally, he was smirking. Outwardly, he had risen to one knee and crouched by her (she was still lying in the sand) and held one hand out.

"Oh shut your face." She giggled.

"Only if you would do me the great and immense honour," he was talking very loudly now and various holidaymakers were peeling themselves off of their towels and away from hideous, badly written romance novels to stare at the two with amused, and occasionally vaguely irritated, expressions. Angelina had noticed this and was blushing furiously, her hair covering one side of her face and her head slightly bowed. She looked like she wanted to disappear. He permitted himself a brief, satisfied smirk. Score one to the Weasley. "Of accompanying me for a swim in the sea!"

"Fred." She hissed, "Stop trying to embarrass me!"

"I'm not trying, love," He said quietly back. "I'm succeeding!" She swatted at him playfully.

"Come on cutie pie, gorgeous girl, my one and only...do you not love me? Do you not wish to express our love with a little fun in the sea where, if we go deep enough, no one will be able to see us?"

She wanted to die. She had never been more mortified in her life. Every single person was staring at her, laughing and giggling and wearing mildly shocked expressions and Fred was having a lovely time, he looked like Christmas had come early.

"If I go in, will you shut up?" She demanded.

He nodded and grinned hugely. She looked away in order to keep her sense of self control and train of thought. She got up, brushed some imaginary sand away (noticing, with an evil smirk, how Fred's eyes followed her hands) and threw her sunglasses lightly onto her towel.

He offered her one hand, she took it and pinched his palm subtly so that none of the surrounding people could see. She smiled sweetly. A few people near them were aww-ing. Fred winced.

"Ouch!" He muttered. "That hurt."

"Good." She whispered back savagely.

"To the sea, my lover!" He said loudly, pulling her towards the blue water.

"You're an idiot." She laughed following him.

"That's why you love me." His mouth twisted into a stupid little half smile that she really wanted to be able to laugh at but, her traitorous brain, found really really adorable. She all but threw herself at him, he laughed as he caught her and kissed her soundly on the lips.

He was an idiot, but he was her idiot.


	57. Percy and Cho 4

**A/N: A Percy and Cho chapter for KewlKat4, natalie211 and Bergere. Erm... another confession, I started this a really long time ago and entirely forgot I was writing it, found it and have now finished it. This does mean that it is not the most requested, the most requested are DracoxKatie and BlaisexHermione – you people do seem to like your hatred ;)**

**So... apologies for the lack of updates recently, just haven't been in the mood to write... can't promise any regular updates because my teachers have decided that what I really need is lots of stress, pressure and homework. Also, I have a few birthdays coming up – Dad's, what would have been Grandsha's and... MY OWN. (6 days- not that I am counting!) so I will have absolutely no time to actually get around to writing. Stick with me, keep reviewing and I promise I will write as soon as I can.**

**Disclaimer: J. owns the Harry Potter series. I own a memory stick shaped like a lego man. Trust me; it's not quite the same.**

Percy x Cho  
The Burrow

Percy.

"Percy dear!" Mum had caught me. I spun round guiltily like a naughty child. Mum stood in the hallway glaring at me. I had wanted to escape the house without all of the clamour and fussing that accompanied publicly declaring your intention to leave. It would have been a nightmare. Mum would have insisted I eat something and Dad would have asked me to wait 'just two minutes' (which would easily become half an hour) so we could travel together. The twins (each of whom actually had their own flats and wives but still seemed to always be here) would have wanted a test subject for some new prank. I wouldn't have been able to leave for at least half an hour. I wouldn't have gotten into work early and I wouldn't be able to get a head start on the mountain of paperwork currently in residence upon my desk.

Unluckily, I had been caught.

"Now where are you going?" She demanded. Her hands crept to her hips and planted themselves their firmly.

"I'm off to work Mum. I've got loads to do..." My voice trailed off at her expression.

She was hurt. I'd hurt her enough. With that one look, I'd do anything she asked. That look had me backtracking, hanging my cloak back up, saying that I could probably wait a while and sitting down for tea and toast. She beamed happily as I sat and fussed about, making tea and trying to force more food on me. Dad appeared from Merlin knows where and sat down. He was chattering about some nightmare at work and drinking copious amounts of tea between words. George Apparated with a loud crack right in the middle of the room, nearly giving Mum a heart attack. He grinned boyishly and sat down with us. Fred was still on honeymoon – Angie had persuaded him to extend it for a week, from the sounds of things he hadn't needed all that much persuading. The others were at school, it was just us. It felt odd having some of us missing.

I was the only one that really missed Bill and Charlie out of my siblings. Ron and Ginny were too young to ever remember what life had been like when they lived at The Burrow and the twins had each other, mostly they just missed the extra two people to prank.

I was the odd one out of my family. Of course, later I became the black sheep. That was a position I had never considered. It was something I regret. It was something that, no matter what I do, I will never be able to forgive myself for. No matter how many times I am forgiven or told that it doesn't matter anymore, I know that it does, it always will.

I was always the loneliest one. Bill and Charlie were actually best friends, although they pretended to hate each other, spending all their time together in secret. The twins, obviously, came as a pair. Ron and Ginny were very close as kids. I didn't quite fit into the whole family thing. I was like the spare part – Ginny was the youngest and the only girl, Bill was the oldest, Charlie was Quidditch captain and a bit rebellious, the twins set up a successful business, Ron befriended the Chosen One and was the youngest boy. I was nothing. I guess that was what made me the deserter. The fact that I didn't fit in, I felt like I didn't need them and they didn't need me. I always had slightly different values to them, I believed, oh for a long while I believed, that they really were in the wrong. I never really felt like part of the family. Until I left. Then I realised how much I loved them, how perfect they were, how much I needed to be with them, that actually I did fit in.

Every day I thank Merlin that forgave me. I wouldn't have blamed them if they hadn't. They didn't need to. And yet, they did.

I missed them all when they weren't around. It felt odd that Bill was married and lived in his own house. It wasn't right that Charlie lived abroad. It was weird that the twins lived in London, in neighbouring flats with their new wives. It didn't make sense that Ron and Ginny and Harry and Hermione were at Hogwarts. I liked it best when we were all together. All of us, the extended family as well as my actual siblings and parents.

Leaving them once has made me far more accepting, of who my family are. I'm a lot more sentimental as well. I like to take photos of them, I even have a big group one on my desk at work. I love spending time with them, before I would avoid family occasions claiming that I had work to do or something to escape the noise and chatter and inane conversations. Now, I wouldn't miss them for the world.

"Percy, dear," Mum said, pulling my attention back to the present.

"Yes?" I guiltily started buttering the toast on my plate worrying that she was going to complain about my lack of appetite.

"Have you seen Cho lately?"

"Erm...day before yesterday." I replied. We'd met at Cho's flat, fulfilled the necessary duties and then I had left. She hadn't asked me to stay, in fact, she had fled into the bathroom and not reappeared until I called out I was going. Then, she had appeared, fully dressed, with wet hair from her recent shower, said goodbye quickly and told me she'd see me soon.

"You should ask her over for dinner again, I'd like to get to know her."

"Quite honestly Mum, I don't think she'd come even if I asked." I said truthfully. Cho hated my family, even a fool could tell that much.

"Please at least ask, Percy. I'd hate for her to feel unwelcome."

"And Mum wants to feed her, she probably thinks she looks a bit on the skinny side." George inserted helpfully.

Mum flicked a tea towel at him. "I did not." She paused. "Well, she is a little bit thin; she could use a few more pounds on her."

We burst into simultaneous laughter. It felt right. Life was good.

Cho.

I woke up at seven and cursed silently under my breath. Getting up early was something I tried to avoid. It was quite simple – the earlier I rose, the more hours there were in the day. I didn't have anything much to fill my time right now.

I had finished with Hogwarts, completed my education. I hadn't got a job. I wasn't even sure what sort of job I wanted. That was the problem. Yes, I could have applied for some low paid, low skilled job which I would have hated until I found something better. I didn't though. I just didn't want to.

I spent my days meeting up with old friends, although I didn't have many of those left and obviously they had their own lives. I saw my parents a lot. I hadn't seen them properly for a while because of school and the war. When the war began, my parents went into hiding whereas I hid out at Hogwarts. We had been separated with no idea if the others were alive or not... I cut that line of thought off, I didn't like to think about those days.

I did other things as well. I still had stuff to do at home. I had painted the walls of my little flat and tried to spruce it up a bit. I spent a lot of time doing meaningless things that passed the time – listening to whole radio shows, visiting the shops to buy daily groceries, reading the newspaper cover to cover, cooking food for myself.

I didn't like to think about that set of facts either. The truth was I was on a long road to nowhere. I spent my days in a permanent state of boredom. I did nothing that meant anything. My life was pointless. Pathetic really, wasn't it?

The only regular company I had was Percy's. Unwelcome as his visits were, sometimes it was a relief to actually see another human being. Percy and I had taken no steps in getting to know one another despite the fact that we were now married. It was a sorry state of affairs. We didn't dislike one another, we just didn't know anything about one another and to be entirely honest, it wasn't like we really even wanted to get to know each other. I wanted as little to do with him as possible. However, I also wanted to at least like my husband. It was a difficult situation. I didn't really know how to act around him. I wanted to hate him – although, really my anger should have been directed at the Ministry for removing my freedom and choice in life. I wanted him to like me as well. He didn't. Well, he didn't act like he did at all. He was completely obsessed with his bloody family. Quite honestly, I wanted him to be a little more obsessed with me.

It was difficult to explain. I didn't like him but I would rather grow to like him, actually make an effort, than spend the rest of my life hating my husband. I had come to terms with the fact that pretty soon I was going to fall pregnant, it was inevitable that nature would take its' course. I didn't want my children to grow up with two parents who lived in separate houses, who barely spoke, who didn't even know anything about the other. I didn't want my kids to know that their parents only got married because they were forced to by law. No child should have to know that about their parents. Children want to know that their parents fell in love, that they are still in love and that they truly want to be with one another.

I would never be able to hide the fact that we had married because of a law from them; it would be everywhere – in the media, on other people's lips. However, I hoped to be able to maybe tell them that that was why we had gotten together and gotten married but that we had got a sort of...fondness for one another.

I didn't want to lie to them. And if protecting my children from the knowledge that their parents had no interest in each other meant that I had to get to know Percy and embrace being a Weasley....well then, that is exactly what I would do.


	58. Draco and Katie 7

**A/N: A Draco and Katie chapter for Whisperheart, Pilks, Bergere, SakuraHarunoGurl, lovenotwarXo, Th Ghst f Slss Frnc, Tok On The Block, aribaconpolarcat and Rainy Summer**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. And I am seriously bored with typing this now.**

Draco x Katie  
Malfoy Mansion

He loved a girl who could hold her drink and Katie certainly could. She'd downed a good few glasses of champagne within a few hours of being there. Probably on an empty stomach as well and she didn't even appear to be slightly tipsy. Good girl.

Of course, it had caught up with her towards the very end of the night. She had continued drinking whilst most of the other females had stopped. He found it amusing to watch her smile sweetly at the other wives and girlfriends and significant others, pretending to join in with their inane chatter whilst secretly throwing in thinly veiled sarcastic remarks which, as the night progressed, steadily grew more insulting and less subtle.

His favourite had been addressed to Astoria Greengrass, a girl he had always rather liked until he had actually spoken to her and then his opinion very quickly changed. The girl was a complete harpie, a real conformist and a gossip into the bargain. Not his type. Katie had all but simpered when being introduced, "Aah, Astoria is it? I remember you from Hogwarts...moved on from that Crabbe fellow then. I'm surprised really, he could do better." Astoria's perfect face had momentarily lapsed into something approaching an actual expression – sheer shock. He had just about managed not to laugh. Instead he had smirked at Astoria and drew Katie away to another group of people.

Katie Malfoy, nee Bell, was his kind of girl. He couldn't deny it, she looked pretty good tonight. She had a dress on, not a big deal she'd been wearing them a lot recently, presumably his Mother's influence. Better than those robes she'd worn before, or, Merlin forbid, the jeans she'd worn in her spare time. The dress in question was pretty modest, nothing too flashy or revealing. Revealing was cheap. Revealing clothes were for high school girlfriends and the girls you spent the night with once and never saw again. He'd been brought up to believe that a woman should only wear revealing clothes for her husband. After all, he didn't want some other man eyeing up his wife. Katie was his, whether she liked it or not. Mostly, she didn't. It didn't really matter what she thought. She was his by law. She would fall for him, eventually. The spells would make sure of that.

And anyway, no woman resisted him for that long. She probably fancied him a little bit now already, all he had to do was turn the charm on and she would fall right at his feet. She was different to his usual conquests though. Mainly that she was his wife. He didn't just want to sleep with her, well obviously he did, he was male after all. But, he wanted her to fall in love with him. He wasn't sure if he wanted to reciprocate on the love or not yet.

It was midnight now and probably time to head home. Katie was still standing with a group of other women and looking incredibly bored. She looked better now than at the beginning of the night actually, he thought, less done up. A few tendrils of hair had escaped from her hairstyle, her make up seemed softer, her cheeks were slightly flushed and her eyes were brighter. It suited her - a slightly mussed look. He found himself wondering what she looked like after a good night out and then very delibarately didn't think about it.

He excused himself from the group of people he was pretending to listen to – having zoned out a long while ago finding the meaningless talk entirely boring and made his way over to Katie. Deftly, he slid an arm around her waist.

"If you'll excuse me ladies, my wife and I need to leave now. If that's okay, darling?" The latter part was directed at Katie who simply nodded. Meanwhile, the others giggled and blushed and said faux saccharine goodbyes.

They probably thought the pair of them were off for some alone time. He wished. It was the charms fault. Bloody spells. He just wanted her all the time, it was seriously embarrassing. And frustrating because she could evidently resist the spells better, she resisted him very well. At the moment anyway.

They walked towards the exit, along with a few other couples. The ballroom was clearing now a few stragglers saying their goodbyes and getting ready to leave. Very few parties or social occasions lasted after midnight, partying into the small hours was not done in polite, upper class company. The sons of the richest families, of course, were a whole other kettle of fish. Draco reminisced, a little wistfully, of the days when he and Blaise, and a few others, would attend these boring social functions with their respective parents and then, afterwards, when the adults had gone home, made their way to some downtown club, drink and dance the night away and spend the night with some girl, not getting home until ten the next morning. Of course, he couldn't do that anymore. None of them could, they were all married now.

Actually, that wouldn't have made one jot of difference to quite a few of his friends, particularly those with ugly or irritating spouses, but the Ministry contracts also had anti-cheating spells placed upon them.

They waited at the cloakroom for the attendant to fetch their cloaks. Draco took his and then remembered that Katie didn't have one. His mother said that the wearing of a cloak would ruin the 'lines of the dress'. Katie, for once, had made no comment about archaic traditions or how utterly freezing she would be. He had wondered if she had been a little nervous about attending the ball. It was clearly the first one she had ever been to. She would get used to them though and the novelty wore off pretty quick. His mother had attended the ball, it was her duty after all to go, but had left early as she usually did. It was obvious that she was missing Lucius. She didn't like to be seen publicly without him.

He removed his own cloak and placed it over Katie's shoulders.

She smiled with something that may have been gratitude. "Thanks." She murmured sleepily.

"You're welcome. It's pretty cold out, you'll need it."

He kept an arm around her waist. It was pathetic but even the briefest, most casual contact with her made his heart thud. That was very bad. Malfoys did not have thudding hearts. They were made of stronger stuff than that.

A little part of his mind noted, with a mixture of surprise, happiness and smugness that she wasn't protesting to the arm around her waist like she usually did. Instead, she seemed to have moved a little closer to him...

Merlin, his imagination was running away with him. He wasn't sure if it was the charms or just his hormones that caused him to be so attracted to Katie or whether it was just a nasty mixture of the two. Whatever it was, it was driving him wild.

"Did you enjoy the ball?"

She pursed her lips, "It was okay. Drags on a bit though, doesn't it?"

He wanted to laugh at her blunt dismissal. "Yeah, I suppose you're right."

"Are we going home?" She said suddenly in a confused tone. "Because I can't remember. I actually can't remember much. I think I've drunk just a tiny bit too much." She giggled tipsily.

"Yes, you have and yes, Kate, we're going home."

"Oh good." She frowned. "Erm...where's home again?""

"I'll take you. It's okay." He kept a firm hold on her waist. Occasionally, her knees would go and he would tighten his grip. She wasn't exactly heavy and a few times he considered just picking her up. The drink had clearly caught up with her now. She'd regret it in the morning.

"I need to sit down." She interjected suddenly. "Now."

Carefully, he placed her on a handily located bench. She looked quite pale. She leaned forward, resting her elbows on her knees and her head on her hands.

"You alright?" He said worriedly. He didn't know how to deal with this sort of thing. Merlin, what if she threw up or something? What on earth would he do then? He crouched down by her. "Katie?"

"Merlin, my head hurts." She moaned.

He stifled a smirk. "Come on, I'll take you home." He stood up, placed a hand under each of her elbows and pulled her to her feet. She fell against him, unable to keep her balance

Later, he would say it was the charms that did it. Truthfully, he wasn't quite sure what made him do it. She was suddenly very close, he could feel her pressed against every part of his body, he could feel her against him. She was way too close. He couldn't think straight. Charms, testosterone and the old Malfoy ego united in that moment. She was giggling slightly, the laughter subsided and she smiled up at him. Merlin, she looked good. He leaned down and pressed his lips against hers. She responded almost instantly.

When both pulled away, their breathing quickened, eyes brightened, hair mussed, he seized her hand and Apparated. They landed just outside the Malfoy grounds, he pulled her to him again into another heated kiss. They all but fell through the gates, still entwined around each other. They reached the door and he took the cloak from her shoulders and handed it to the house elf standing by the door. He yanked her up into his arms and carried her to his bedroom door.

He stopped and looked at her questioningly. She nodded and pulled his head to hers as he pushed the door open.

-

She stretched out luxuriantly and felt something warm beside her, something human. Merlin. She opened one eye and then closed it very quickly. She hadn't. Please, please, please Merlin, tell her she hadn't.

"Morning love."

She had.


	59. Blaise and Hermione 8

**A/N: Okay, so I've been shamed into writing another chapter as quickly as is humanely possible simply because of the response I got. I know it can sound a little bit repetitive, but I would really like to thank everyone who had reviewed or put my story on alert or favourite. Thank you and please do keep reading, reviewing and requesting.**

**This is Blaise and Hermione for goldeneyes20601, Th Ghst f Slss Frnc, , Rainy Summer, Tik Tok On The Block, sonea91 and gWeasley77.**

**Disclaimer: Not mine. Not mine. Not mine. Kay?**

Blaise x Hermione  
Hogwarts

Mrs Zabini was just sitting down to dinner when the news came. It was both welcome and unwelcome in equal parts. Welcome in that the Zabini line would be carried on, that their name would continue for another generation, their family would live on, unwelcome in that the carrier was a Muggle born and that the blood line had become polluted, contaminated, the heirs would be half blood. She had had to pull a few strings at the Daily Prophet, calling in a few favours with a few old friends, to ensure that the news appeared in tomorrow's paper. It really paid to have friends in the right places. Many people in her position had contacts. Not many bothered with the media. They were fools. They didn't realise how important the media was. The media, newspapers in particular, were excellent places for boasting.

There had been a few other pregnancy announcements recently but none from such high up, Pureblooded families as theirs. It was an accomplishment really – her son was clearly the most fertile, the most virile, the healthiest. He had accomplished what the other Pureblood sons hadn't quite managed yet – he had made his wife pregnant. He had fulfilled his duty. He had provided an heir.

The following morning arrived and the news was splashed across the Announcements page. Mrs Zabini was thrilled. She had been flooded with congratulations from all of her, clearly jealous, friends. She would soon have a grandchild. She hoped for a boy although it would be rather nice to have a little girl to raise as the perfect Pureblood wife. Whichever gender it was, the child would be perfect.

They would be obviously good looking, although hopefully they wouldn't inherit their mother's looks, probably with dark hair and blue eyes. They would have the best of everything right from birth. They would be raised in money, given the sort of breeding one could only dream of. They would be taught impeccable manners, they would attend social functions from a very young age. If it was a girl, she would never wear trousers, would learn to dance, to speak foreign languages, to play music. She would break hearts the day from the age of fourteen. She would make a flawless marriage to someone high up, of an equal rank with money to their name. If it was a boy, he would learn to be a perfect Pureblood male, schooled in business and law and finance, he would marry the richest, most beautiful girl of his class and go on to continue the Zabini line.

Ministry guidelines specified that a minimum of three children must be produced. Any less than three per couple and there would be no change to the overall population. Two children would simply replace their parents, three would provide a much needed surplus.

This meant that she would end up with three, perhaps four or even five, perfect grandchildren. Of course, Hermione should have minimal impact on their lives. She suspected that Hermione would not mind relinquishing control over her children's lives to their grandmother, it was clear that Hermione would grow to resent the child who would be the epitome of everything she hated.

No, Hermione would not mind handing her children over. She clearly was not the maternal type. She would give her children funny ideas. Muggle ideas. Ideas that Muggles and Muggleborns and half-bloods were just as good as them.

Hermione should definitely be removed from the situation. Perhaps, Blaise could even buy Hermione her own house somewhere. She could choose where – she could be near her friends if that was what she wanted. Hermione could live there quite happily, seeing Blaise when she had to and perhaps visiting her children once a month or something like that.

Yes, Hermione would certainly approve of that. Perhaps, the girl could even be permitted to get a job. If she was distanced from the family as much as possible, well it wouldn't really reflect badly on them at all.

Mrs Zabini was, she mused, very happy with the situation. In fact, it was not even really unwelcome news anymore, it was very welcome indeed.

-

The whispers started the second she crossed the threshold to the Great Hall. Whispers, smothered giggles, pointing.

She knew what they were saying even though they took care not to let her hear what they whispered and gossiped about. She knew the news would get out eventually. She had hoped for a few more days though. Clearly Mrs Zabini knew all the right people.

Hermione Granger, know it all, bookworm, voted most likely to succeed (or she would have been, if Hogwarts had taken a vote on such things) was pregnant.

Pregnant with the spawn of a Slytherin.

Pregnant with a baby she wished didn't exist.

Pregnant with a baby that she didn't even want to acknowledge was hers yet.

She was the first Hogwarts student to be officially declared as pregnant. There had been a lot of rumours about various students, all of which soon proved to be false. She was the very first. Of course, there would be others. Others would become pregnant, probably very soon. It was hard to be the very first though. There were no forerunners, no one to give her advice or tell her what to do or what would happen next or how to deal with it all.

She had never even considered the possibility of being a teenage mum. In the Muggle world, such things happened but were often frowned upon. In the wizarding world, marrying young and having kids young was commonplace. Not quite this young though. Good witches tended to wait until actually completing school before getting knocked up.

She flew to her seat and sunk onto a bench between Harry and Ron.

Ron looked up and said through a mouthful of toast. "'Oss a ma'a?"

She raised an eyebrow, feeling faintly nauseous.

Ron swallowed and repeated. "What's the matter?"

Ginny appeared from nowhere, sitting down beside Harry and brandishing a copy of the Daily Prophet. "This is the matter. That stupid cow put an announcement in the paper."

"Merlin." Harry said dumbly. He rubbed absent mindedly at his forehead, the anti-cheating spells were probably protesting at Ginny sitting so close to him.

"At least I don't have to tell anyone. Everyone already knows." Hermione said quietly. "That's a good thing."

"I guess." Ginny said doubtfully.

People were still watching. Hermione could almost feel their stares on her skin. She was drowning in stares.

Ginny glared at the people closest to them. They looked away hurriedly.

"Merlin, people are so rude." Ginny announced loudly. A few people sitting near them blushed slightly, some even shuffled up a bit away from them. Ginny permitted herself a quick satisfied smile.

Hermione smiled faintly in response. "Don't worry about it. I'll be fine."

"Sure? You should eat something." Ginny told her.

"Not hungry."

"But that baby will be, you have to look after yourself. It's not just you anymore, Hermione. It's the two of you now."

Hermione reached for a piece of toast, managing just two bites before the stares and the pointing and Ginny's word became too much. She stood up and fled from the Hall.

Echoes rung in her ears.

_It's not just you...Merlin, Hermione, the first...she's got a bun in the oven...you're baby...Zabini...Hermione Zabini...two of you...baby....baby...baby..._

The very idea of a baby scared her. She wasn't ready to be a mother to anyone. She'd never really been the maternal type, she'd never liked children much and she hadn't really wanted any of her own. When she thought of her future, it included a career and promotions and probably a husband, but not children. There was no room for a gurgling baby or a chubby toddler or a sticky school child or a moody teenager in her life.

This baby had kicked it's way into her life and she just didn't want it. She knew that technically it was little more than a cluster of cells right now but still...it would grow to become a real living, breathing baby and it would be entirely dependent on its mother. Her.

She couldn't be a mother. She was eighteen! That wasn't anywhere near old enough. She didn't know how to feed a baby or change a nappy or keep it entertained to stop it crying. She didn't have any experience with this sort of thing.

She couldn't even bring herself to love this baby yet as a mother was supposed to. After all, one half was her but the other half was all Zabini.

-

His friends had found it hilarious. He had been the butt of many jokes recently. They had taunted him about his common Muggle born wife, his Muggle in-laws and now, how his children would be half bloods.

He didn't care though. Well, not that much. He was going to be the one laughing when the Zabini family became one of the good guys again because of his marriage with Granger whilst the Malfoys and the Notts and the Crabbes were still blackmarked.

The having kids bit didn't really bother him much, his mother would sort them out with minimal input from him. He had known that he would have very little to do with his children, no matter who their mother was. He didn't want to have anything much to do with children until they could speak in full sentences, were toilet trained and had decent manners. He was hoping for a son. Although, a daughter wouldn't be all that bad.

A son would carry on the line though. A son could run the family business. Most of the Pureblood families traditionally only had one child – a single heir to carry on the name, two if the first child was female. However, the Ministry were insisting on at least three. He wanted three – one boy and two girls. His son could carry on the Zabini name, marry a good girl and reproduce, he could be trained to run the business. His daughters would be raised with impeccable manners, exquisite taste and perfect good looks, they would grow up to make good, Pureblood marriages.

Surprisingly, he had actually noticed Hermione as she came down for breakfast. It wasn't all that shocking really though. Every head in the room had turned to her. Everyone was staring at her stomach as if it would have suddenly grown to twice its size since yesterday. They were whispering and murmuring and giggling. At least he hadn't got to carry the baby around for nine months. There would be no visible evidence, at least until the child was born, that he was going to be a parent.

She had flushed a brilliant shade of red. She had actually looked like a Weasley for a bit. Apart from the red hair and freckles, of course. He had watched discreetly as she sunk onto a bench looking like she wanted the ground to open up and swallow her. He had watched as she had exchanged a few words with a couple of her Weasley friends and Potter. He had watched her take a mouthful of toast before fleeing the Hall, everyone staring at her as she ran.

He hadn't meant to feel anything. But he had felt sorry for her.


	60. Seamus and Parvati 3

**A/N: The most requested was Ron and Padma but it makes more sense to have this chapter first. I will write Ron and Padma as soon as I get time to.**

**So, this is Seamus and Parvati for sapphirerubys and Lady Eleanor Boleyn.**

**Disclaimer: Bla bla bla...not mine...bla bla.... J. K. Rowling's.....bla bla bla...**

Seamus x Parvati  
Hogwarts

She opened her eyes, felt an unwelcome feeling well up in her throat and ran straight to the bathroom where she promptly threw up into the toilet. She hated the sensation of being sick, admittedly no one actually enjoyed it, but she really really hated it. It made her feel terrible for the whole day.

Great. Her whole day was ruined and she was only five minutes into it.

She slumped on the floor, reaching up groggily with one hand to flush the toilet. It gurgled next to her for a few moments before falling silent. She shuddered. She pushed her hair back with one hand and left her hand resting against her forehead, pulling her knees up to her chest.

She felt awful. Really awful.

It was probably food poisoning. She hadn't been that hungry lately, everything seemed to taste weird at the moment, too strong, over powering almost. It made her feel unwell. She had eaten chicken last night though because it didn't have an overly strong flavour. It had probably been off. Food poisoning, great.

Usually the House Elves cooked everything perfectly, it was strange that last night they hadn't. Weird.

She thought about moving, her stomach groaned in protest. She couldn't go to classes at the moment. She felt horrible.

She remained frozen on the floor for a few minutes before she realised that, actually, she was feeling a bit better. Carefully, gripping the sink for support, she rose to her feet. The nausea had passed. She felt alright actually. Her knees felt a bit shaky but that was normal for her when she'd just thrown up.

She took a few deep breaths and reached for a glass, filling it with water and taking a few hesitant sips. The water cleared the bitter taste from her mouth. She paused, just waiting for the nausea to return. It didn't. For now.

Actually, she felt kind of hungry now. That was odd, usually when she'd been sick it was because she was ill. Illness didn't usually make her want to eat. She climbed into shower, feeling instantly better as the water cleaned her skin.

Fully dressed now, with her hair and makeup as immaculate as ever, she made her way into the common room, Seamus was waiting at the foot of the stairs for her. She flew into his arms and kissed him.

"You alright?" He asked.

"Yeah, I felt a bit funny this morning though."

"Funny? Like what?" Concern furrowed his brow.

"I was sick." She explained. "I feel fine now, really."

"You were sick? You have to go see Madam Pomfrey."

"But I feel fine. Honestly, there's no need."

"You're ill, c'mon. I'll take you."

"I seriously don't need to. I'm hungry so can we just go get some breakfast."

Seamus dithered for a long moment before reluctantly agreeing. "Okay then but if you feel ill again you have to promise to go to the Hospital Wing."

Parvati rolled her eyes. "Promise." He kissed her forehead, took her hand and they walked down to breakfast.

The Great Hall echoed with noise, the clamour of voices climbing over each other as various students discussed homework and Potions lessons and who was dating whom and endless other morsels of gossip. Usually, Parvati would have joined them with rumours of her own. Since her marriage however, she just hadn't found it as engrossing as before. Seamus had once told her that he didn't really enjoy gossiping, he said he thought it was a bit petty. He hadn't meant anything, of course. In fact, he probably hadn't registered that what he had said even applied to her. She hadn't said anything in response but she was trying to be a person who was good enough for him.

Because, well, she might be biased but he was pretty amazing. He was brave and courageous and loyal and handsome and friendly and funny and pretty much perfect for her. And of course, it didn't hurt that he was completely in love with her and she couldn't imagine a day without him.

-

She woke up in Seamus' arms, her favourite place to be. Usually, she spent as long as possible there, sometimes skipping breakfast rather than miss an extra half hour with him.

However, today she pulled herself away and dashed to the tiny bathroom next to their bedroom chamber. She leaned over the toilet again and threw up. She moaned and sat down on the ground again just as Seamus appeared in the doorway.

"You alright, babe?" He moved to kneel beside her and smoothed her hair gently from her forehead.

"No." She said sarcastically, regretting it almost instantly. "Sorry." She murmured. "Can't stand being sick, makes me grumpy. Sorry."

"Nothing to be sorry for." He grinned at her and she smiled back.

He sat with her for a few minutes until she felt slightly better and just about managed to get up.

He kept a hand on the small of her back as she stood up and frowned at her reflection in the mirror. "I think you should go see Madam Pomfrey." He insisted.

"I feel better now though." She said. "Look like crap but still, I feel better."

"Firstly, you never look crap. You're beautiful." She grinned like an idiot and blushed as well, just to add a little more embarrassment to things. "And secondly, you promised you'd go again if you felt ill."

"But I don't feel ill anymore." She stressed. She turned to him and put a hand to his face. She felt him relax slightly under her touch. "I'm fine." She pecked him on the lips. "Now, come on. I'm hungry and breakfast is soon and I'm not even dressed."

He grinned cheekily. "I don't mind."

She swatted at his shoulder playfully. "Come on, I'm starving."

-

"Parvati?" Padma said softly, touching Parvati's shoulder gently. Parvati looked up from her seat in the library.

"Hey Padma. How've you been?"

The Patil twins had been close up until they reached Hogwarts. They had been sorted into different houses. They had still been best friends for about half a year before a very very gradual drifting apart had begun. They had made other friends, friends that were allowed to be in the same common room as them and slept in the same dormitories at night. Friends that were in their houses. The house divide had caught up to the twins. Of course, they had still spoken every day. Only now they didn't really know everything about each other, they were sisters rather than twins.

The War had pulled them together. Wars tended to do that. They looked out for each other, they were in hiding together. They were united again.

After the War the distance had set in a little. Both had turned to their friends but remained closer than they had been in a long time. More recently they had bonded over their love for their respective husbands. And, of course, it probably didn't hurt that Parvati wasn't really friends with Lavender anymore. Padma had never liked Lavender that much and Parvati had been best friends with her. Now Lavender was sort of out of the picture, Padma had become her best girl friend again. They were twins again.

"I'm fine. You?" She sat down next to Parvati.

"I'm good."

"Liar." Padma said with an amused smile. "I've spoken to Seamus. He said you keep throwing up."

Parvati tutted. "Did he come and find you?"

"Yeah, he was worried. He's entitled to be worried, you are his wife."

"I know. I wish he wouldn't worry. It's so weird though, Pad. It comes and then it just goes like that and then I feel completely fine."

Padma smiled, sometimes being the smarter twin paid off. "Sweetie, do you think you could be...well...pregnant?"

Parvati laughed. "No. Can't be."

"Actually, you can. Contraceptives are banned and...well, I know you two are doing it. The whole world is. There's a big chance you could be pregnant."

Parvati blushed faintly. "But, I haven't had any symptoms."

Padma actually laughed out loud. "Let me see...well, you're saying that everything smells too strong and tastes over powering. You're throwing up in the mornings and only the mornings. That's two early signs of pregnancy."

"How d'you know about the smell stuff?"

"Seamus."

They exchanged glances.

"Oh." Parvati said quietly. "Merlin, I can't be."

"Why not?"

"I can't be a mum. I don't know how to be and we haven't even, even discussed it yet. And anyway it's not meant to happen yet!" Parvati wailed with more than a touch of melodrama.

Padma stifled a smile. Parvati had always planned things, spontaneity unnerved her. There was nothing more spontaneous than an unplanned pregnancy. Her twin would be an amazing mother, that much she knew.

"No one knows how to be a mother. And yeah, it's probably absolutely terrifying but no one knows what to expect. You'll be a really good mum, Par. I know you will."

Parvati hugged her twin. "But it wasn't supposed to be yet!"

"You can't follow a plan for your whole life, Par. Sometimes things have to be left to chance."

Parvati sniffed miserably. "Will...will you come with me and...do the spell?" She asked timidly.

Padma nodded. "Course. Course I will."

-

They were sitting together on the floor of the Prefect's Bathroom. Neither of them were Prefects (Padma had been in her first final year but she had given it up to concentrate on her studies this year), luckily the password hadn't been changed.

Parvati squeezed her eyes tightly shut. "Tell me, tell me. What does it say?"

Padma muttered the spell under her breath, pointing her wand at Parvati's stomach. A perfectly round pink circle appeared in the air, flashed white for a second and then disappeared.

"You're pregnant!"


	61. Ron and Padma 5

**A/N: Ron and Padma for Crazy-Obsessed-Writer52, BrightMikal, lovenotwarXo, sonea91, goldeneyes20601, Grey Eyed, Reader-1996, LovelyRoses and Kirsti-Lee.**

**Wow, this so didn't turn out like I'd planned! Hope you like it – please review and request!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own HP. **

Ron x Padma  
Hogwarts

They were a bit of a fade-into-the-background sort of couple. They weren't flamboyant or passionate or lovey-dovey. Their love would never be the stuff of fairytales or feature in the plot of a bestseller but it was oddly perfect. They were together in a quiet, together sort of way.

They were pretty much always together actually. Padma had sweet talked the Fat Lady a few times until she was putty in her hands, and now she was a Gryffindor in all but name. She spent all of her available time with Ron so when he went to the Gryffindor Common Room, then so did she. He had been in the Ravenclaw Common Room a few times but he preferred to be around his friends and she had no special reason for staying with the few Ravenclaw friends she still had and anyway, you had to answer a riddle type question to get in and he wasn't very good at answering them.

She ate meals at the Gryffindor table. She had more Gryffindor friends than Ravenclaw ones. She studied with Hermione. She was one of them now.

She liked being one of them. It felt right. She had always wanted to be in Gryffindor, right from when she was a little kid and her dad had told her and Parvati all about Hogwarts. She had been heartbroken when she was sorted into Ravenclaw, Parvati had gotten the coveted Gryffindor place. Ironically, Parvati hadn't even had a preference for any house.

She was a Gryffindor now. And it felt good. Ravenclaws were far more solitary and a lot more studious. Ravenclaw parties were few and far in between. When you walked into the Ravenclaw Common Room, the rustle of pages and the scratching of quills on parchment mixed with quiet murmurs greeted you rather than the Gryffindor hum of noisy chatter, bursts of raucous laughter and the occasional lion roar. She liked being a Gryffindor, it was where she was meant to be. Maybe, she often thought, the Sorting Hat had just gotten her wrong.

Secretly, she knew the Hat had been right. When she had first gotten to Hogwarts, she had been a real Ravenclaw. She had been studious and bright and quiet. She had gotten on well with the other Ravenclaws – bonded over their love of knowledge.

He had changed her though. It was true – one Ronald Weasley had made her into a different person, a better person. She was still her, of course, plain old Padma Patil who liked books and knowledge and learning and occasional quiet time, only she was a better, more interesting sort of person now, she also liked noise and company and fun.

She climbed through the Portrait Hole. Ron and Harry were sitting on the sofa, talking Quidditch if the looks on their faces was any kind of indication. Ron looked up as she entered. He always managed to do that. Whenever she walked into a room, he always noticed her first. She didn't know how he did it but she loved that he did.

"Hey." He smiled.

She sat down beside him.

"Hello. Hey Harry."

He tucked his arm around her, she nestled into his embrace. Harry nodded at her and they continued their talk. She zoned out, Quidditch talk bored her. She just wanted to be with him.

After a while, she wasn't sure how long, Harry stood up suddenly. Ron didn't seem surprised so evidently Harry had made his excuses.

"See ya later you two." Harry said with a parting wave.

"He's off to find Gin." Ron explained.

Padma nodded and kissed him chastely on the lips.

"I've missed you." He said awkwardly. A faint blush coloured his pale skin.

He didn't very often say sweet things. It wasn't really his style. She didn't mind, it wasn't like she was the romantic, sweet nothings type herself. It also had the added benefit of making so much more special when he did say something nice like that.

"You too. I was with Parvati today."

"Yeah." Ron said absent mindedly, running his fingers through her hair.

"She's pregnant." Padma said. Ron froze, his fingers still tangled in her hair.

"Wow. Woah. That's...unexpected."

"Really?" Padma said seriously, turning to face him. "They're married and sleeping together every other day with no contraception. Does no one know the facts of life? Why does everyone think it's so unexpected?"

"Yeah, guess you're right. Just, they don't seem...you know, old enough to have a-a baby." Ron said in a pacifying tone.

"None of us are." She retorted, most of the anger had dissipated now.

"No." Ron paused. "This isn't where you say you're expecting too, is it?"

Padma giggled. "No."

"Good. I can't be a Daddy yet."

Padma's laugh stopped abruptly and Ron desperately tried to work out what he had done wrong and precisely how he could apologise in the most grovelling terms but still maintain a shred of dignity.

"It's gonna happen soon, Ron. You know that, don't you? Every single girl in this school is going to end up pregnant. Everyone. It won't be long before nature kicks in. We're just lucky that it's been this long."

Ron blinked dumbly. He'd never really thought about it like that but she was right. Nature would kick in soon enough and his Padma would end up pregnant and she'd have a baby, his baby. Merlin.

Woah. Wow. This was huge. Really big. He wasn't ready to be a dad. He could barely look after himself, let alone a baby. Fathers were supposed to be knowledgeable and practical and wise. Very wise. He wasn't any of these things. He was nineteen. He was barely legal. Neither of them were ready yet.

He noticed that she was watching him, scrutinising his expression. He really should say something, comfort her, let her know that he was okay and that she was okay and that everything really would be, you know, okay. He didn't. His thoughts were still running wild.

She wasn't old enough to be a mother. Of course, she would be a better parent than he would. She was capable and practical and sensible. She would be a good mother. She probably didn't want a baby yet though, not many people their age did. This would affect her more than him.

He could still have an adult, grown up life. He could finish school and get a job. In fact, it would now be completely necessary for him to get a job as soon as he finished school. When Hogwarts was over (and there were just eight months left of this school year, including holidays) they would need someplace to live. He couldn't go back home anymore. He had a wife now and by that time, he might even have a kid as well.

But Padma, she couldn't get a job yet. She had to have at least three children under Ministry law. If she had one a year, beginning this year, she would be twenty one by the time she'd had three. She wouldn't be able to go out to work full time until they were all at Hogwarts. That would be eleven years until the last was old enough to go. She would be thirty two. Thirty two.

It would be fourteen long years before she could have an adult life. He'd never thought about it like that. He had always been so focused on his own feelings, the things he would miss, the things he couldn't do. He'd never really given much thought to the other people in all of this mess. So true, he couldn't date random girls or have one night stands.

But, on the other hand, he had found Padma, his true love. The Law had pushed them together, made sure they found each other quicker and given them more time together.

He'd never really thought about the girl's feelings in all of this. They were missing out on more. They would have to raise the children, the children that were surely on their way. They'd fought Voldemort and his Death Eaters, but they couldn't fight Mother Nature. Ironic, really.

At first, he'd hated the Law. Then he'd thought it was unfair. Next, he'd thought it was okay really. Then he'd loved it. And now, now he thought the Law was destroying dreams, crushing lives, ruining ambition.

"I'm sorry." He spluttered.

Padma looked shocked. "Sorry? Why?"

"Because you're gonna have kids soon and it'll be my fault and you don't want them, not yet and I'm sorry for that...and I'm just...sorry." He finished lamely.

Padma's face softened. "You're sorry because you're going to make me pregnant?" He nodded. She smirked slightly. "You don't have to apologise for that! It's okay. Sure, I would rather have waited a few years before having children. But I always wanted children and then I met you and fell in love with you and then I wanted to have your children. I can deal with losing a few years of teenage fun if it means I get you forever." She looked a little embarrassed, like she always did when she said stuff like that.

Ron thought he might quite possibly love her more in this moment than he had ever thought possible. He leaned down and kissed her soundly. When they finally pulled apart, he leaned his forehead against hers, their breathing slightly quickened.

"Love you." He kissed the tip of her nose.

She closed her eyes, reaching for his hand and twining her fingers through his. "Love you too, forever."

"Always." He promised.


	62. Harry and Ginny 6

**A/N: Hey – sorry it has been so long since my last update. I have been working on my Twilight story (called Jailbait, it is about Rachel and Paul, if you are interested) and just had no time to update this. Jailbait is nearly finished so I should have a lot more time to concentrate on this.**

**So, this is a Harry and Ginny chapter for FaithfulHPReader, , Lunaclaw14, harrypotterfreak-othlover, Mint and lemon, gWeasley77, MidnightIsCalling, Afrenchgirl, MarauderPrincess96 and LovelyRoses.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Harry x Ginny  
Hogwarts

This was possibly the first time he had ever voluntarily gone to McGonagall's office. He might know McGonagall a lot better now than when he was just a frightened first year but she was still as intimidating as ever.

She worked from Dumbledore's old study now – the Head's office.

She had also, they had discovered, kept the password the same.

"Cockroach cluster." Harry had said it rather doubtfully. Would their Headmistress really keep the password the same? Apparently so. They had exchanged smirks as they stepped onto the staircase.

They had kept as far away from each other as possible in the narrow staircase. They hated the distance between them but the pain just wasn't worth it.

What kind of married couple were they; he thought bitterly, they couldn't even hold hands.

She looked tired and pale and drawn. The pain was worse for her or she had a lesser pain threshold than he did, either way she definitely suffered more than he did. He was used to pain, he could take it. She couldn't. She hated being weak, she hated being in pain, she hated staying away from him. It was a vicious circle. He felt guilty whenever he was near her knowing that her pain was worse than what he was feeling. He just couldn't stay away from her though. He had lived without her for much longer than he had wanted to. He just wanted to be with her forever. Was that so much to ask?

They stepped out off of the staircase. He reached forward and knocked on the door.

"Come in." McGonagall called.

It was different inside, very different. Much of the room had been destroyed in the Battle. It was customary that the Head's Office would be changed only by the current Head. Professor McGonagall had made several changes. Harry had heard from Molly that Minerva couldn't stand having it the same, she said the memories were too much.

The room was darker, there were fewer windows and the furniture was solid, heavy, dark wood. The same paintings hung on the wall. Harry scanned the room for Dumbledore's. It took pride of place behind McGonagall. Dumbledore was sitting up in his chair, grinning at Harry. As Harry watched, he winked and then pretended to fall asleep when Minerva turned around to eye him suspiciously.

"Mr Potter, Mrs Potter, how can I help you?" She said with a severe look as they entered. Clearly she had not been anticipating their visit or for them to have remembered the password.

"We have a problem." Harry said gravely.

She surveyed each in turn before waving her wand briskly in the air. As she did so, the door closed silently, as if afraid to make too loud a noise, and two chairs flew forward, hitting them in the back of the knees and making them sit before her.

"What's the problem, Harry?"

"Well, Ginny and I are married, as you know. Only...we kept having these pains, headaches really, whenever we were together. Worse when we were in contact with each other. Hermione did some research and...well, our original marriage contracts have been activated." McGonagall blinked slowly. "They think we're committing adultery and the charms are working against us."

McGonagall's lips had thinned to a deadly line. "How on earth did that happen?"

"It was deliberate." Harry said. "We think the Ministry is behind it."

She nodded once curtly. "I have no doubt they are. The Ministry are punishing you. I had expected something like this. You humiliated the Ministry, Mr Potter, and now they are punishing you for this." She paused for a very long minute, frowning in concentration. "I am afraid that there is no piece of magic I can do to reverse this, not without seeing the contracts and I very much doubt Minister Shacklebolt would allow that." They nodded – they had expected that.

"But, you still have a lot of power at the Ministry, Professor. You could get them to be deactivated or whatever."

She nodded. "Of course, Potter. I will talk to the Minister at once. This is despicable and cowardly. Backhand, disgusting." She seemed to have forgotten that Harry and Ginny were still sitting before her. "Who would do something like this to school age pupils? Disgusting. The whole system is flawed, rotten from the bottom to the very top. A new age, Kingsley said, no corruption, an open and honest government and then they go and do something like this. I won't stand for it. Kingsley will listen to me."

"Thanks." Harry cut in, sensing that she had no intention of finishing anytime soon. He had been expecting a much harder battle than this. He had expected to not be believed. However, McGonagall was evidently on their side. That was good. She was a formidable ally, a much needed friend, she would speak to Kingsley and this whole thing would be sorted out.

Ginny exhaled a large breath she didn't even realise she had been holding in on the way back down to the main school.

Harry grinned at her – from an arm's length away, of course. "I didn't think she'd believe us so quickly."

"Me neither." She admitted. "But then she's always hated the Ministry, hasn't she? It probably isn't hard for her to believe stuff like that."

Harry paused. "The thing I find the hardest...to believe is that Kingsley had to be part of this."

She nodded seriously. "I know. I thought we were...not friends, but you know, we fought together. For the same side. I didn't think he'd do something like this."

Harry shook his head grimly. "Me neither."

"We're in the right here though, Harry." She said softly. "Don't doubt that."

He started to protest but she cut him off. "Don't. I've seen that look in your eyes. The Law is wrong, Harry. For us it is wrong. For some people the Law was good, for us it was wrong. We were right to defy it."

He hung his head, ashamed, muttering his next words. "It's just...when Voldemort was in power, it felt right to defy the Ministry 'cos he was the head of it. Only now, now the good guys are supposed to be in power and...I dunno...it feels more like I've done wrong now."

"You haven't." She said firmly. "And if you ever describe our marriage as 'wrong' again, I will curse you into next week." She smiled sweetly.

He threw his head back and laughed. "Sorry." He managed. "I didn't mean it like that."

"I know." She said, reaching out towards him and then jerking back as if electrocuted. Her hand flew to her head and her eyes squeezed shut.

He said nothing, did nothing; he couldn't even comfort his own wife. He could do nothing. He was powerless.

"I hate this." She said in a low voice when the pain had receded somewhat. "I hate being weak."

"You're not weak." He denied hotly.

She managed a faint ghost of a smile.

"I feel it." She whispered.

-

McGonagall summoned them to her office the very next morning.

They had bounded in, smiles painted across both of their faces and hope evident in their eyes.

Their smiles had faded very quickly and the hope had died at McGonagall's expression.

Sure both of them had seen her angry, pretty much the entire school had, but this was something else. She was almost apoplectic with rage.

"It seems." She said in a voice that was slow and quiet and all the more menacing for it.

"That the Minister," she all but spat the word. "Has no knowledge of the activation of your contracts and as such, no action will be taken. I cannot see the contract, to ascertain whether it has indeed been activated, because it goes against Ministry protocol."

Harry rested his elbows on his knees and his head in his hands. Ginny's face froze, she couldn't believe this. She couldn't bring herself to move. She had been so hopeful; she had believed absolutely that McGonagall would be able to solve this. She had even harboured a flare of hope that Kingsley really hadn't had anything to do with this, that he hadn't really known, someone else had done this.

Hope was gone now.

Kingsley had denied any involvement but his work was all over this. He had done it, perhaps not directly, but he had known about it.

Harry looked like he might cry with disappointment. He wouldn't, of course, he had only cried five times in front of her.

Once for Sirius, when he was killed in the battle at the Ministry and Harry had lost yet another person he had loved.

Once for Dumbledore, when Snape Avada'd him off of the Tower and Harry had realised that he was now entirely alone.

Once for Dobby, although she hadn't seen this, he had told her about it, he said Dobby had died for him and he was eternally grateful.

Once when the memorial plaque was unveiled – in gratitude, he had told her later, because they had all died helping him.

Once for his parents, when he took her to see his parent's grave and they had laid flowers in remembrance and he had told her that he so wished he could have introduced her to them.

She had been secretly glad that she didn't have to. Her siblings spoke in horror about the nightmare-ish first meeting with the future in-laws.

She wanted to cry at the injustice of it all. She had fought for so long. She had always been fighting.

She had fought for Harry, to get him to like her. She had fought Voldemort, she had kept fighting, even when Harry was gone with Hermione and Ron and she didn't know if her family were safe, or if the Trio were safe or if she was going to make it through. She had fought the Ministry, running from Lee to marry Harry, her true love. She had fought for the right side her whole life.

She had been let down.

It was brutally unfair. The Ministry owed Harry their lives, Harry had saved them all. He had nearly died doing so, in fact, he had told her that he thought he had died. And now, the Ministry were being so petty and so cruel and so bloody stupid that they were tearing the two of them apart.

She couldn't even reach over and touch Harry – to comfort him and reassure him that it was going to be okay.

It would hurt. And it might be lies, she didn't know if it would be okay. Not at all.

Harry looked up and took a deep breath. His eyes were dark with rage. "Then we have to go to Plan B." He looked at her for confirmation, she nodded once.

"Let's do this." She said grimly. "Let's go public."


	63. Neville and Hannah 3

**A/N: Neville and Hannah, definitely one of my most neglected couples, as requested by x8jessica8x, Lunaclaw14, RebeccaLL, AbigailSeville24, MidnightIsCalling, Whisperheart and LovelyRoses .**

**I got a review asking for Neville and Hannah to have a happy scene. Sorry to disappoint but there isn't a lot of happiness for the couple right now, perhaps in future chapters they can be happier. Of course, for that to happen they have to be requested!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Neville x Hannah  
St Mungo's

Life was hard. Life was a struggle. Life was unfair.

For Neville, life had never been especially fair. It was as if Lady Luck had deserted him from birth. He had lost his parents, not in body for both were still physically upon this planet, but certainly their minds' were lost, he had been brought up by his formidable grandmother and spent his whole life trying, and mostly failing, to make her proud, he had been the clumsiest, least academic student in their school year and just about managed to cope with the work, he had fought in the Final Battle and had gotten so close to dying so many times.

He had remained strong throughout.

He had found bright points, things or people or moments that made life better. He had married Hannah Abbott – his true love. He had made his Gran proud in the end. He had triumphed in the Battle. He had killed Nagini and helped to defeat Voldemort. He had made friends, lots of them.

He had made his Gran proud, that was the biggest achievement.

Looking at her now, lying in a hospital bed, eyes closed, pale skinned, barely taking in shallow breaths, it was hard to believe that she had ever intimidated and terrified him as a young boy. She looked small and fragile (two words that had certainly never been associated with Augusta Longbottom before) and old, frighteningly old.

He had always thought of his Gran as strong, ageless and permanent. He had never imagined that she would go. She was supposed to be here forever.

She had become his mother and father and grandmother and grandfather and brother and sister. The family he had never had.

She hadn't been the touchy-feely, openly loving type. That was okay. She wasn't like that, she could have tried but it would have been false and that wouldn't have felt right. She loved him, he knew that. She didn't say it often (he could remember just three occasions) but he knew she did, even if she couldn't bring herself to say it.

He had been much more than a grandson to her as well, he had been her substitute child because Frank couldn't be mothered any longer, he had been her companion when her husband, his grandfather, had died a few years ago, he had been her friend.

He couldn't lose her.

She was all he had and he didn't quite know what he would do without her. She was supposed to be in his life and now, now it didn't even look like she would ever wake up.

She had to wake up.

Had to.

He needed her to wake up.

"C'mon Gran. Just open your eyes. C'mon. For me. Please." He spoke in a low, fierce tone.

There wasn't a flicker of movement.

"Come on, there's no one else here. Just me and you and I need you to wake up. Please." He continued to plead. She had to wake up. If he asked long enough then she would definitely wake up, she would get annoyed after a while and have to say something. She would definitely wake up. She had to because he didn't have anyone else. He had Hannah, his beautiful wife, who he loved her more than anything, but she wasn't Gran.

The door opened very quietly and Hannah stepped in, clutching two cups of coffee. She offered one to him. He took it and nodded a thanks at her.

He hated coffee but he needed the caffeine. He had to stay awake because she was going to wake up and he had to be there when she did. She would never forgive him if he wasn't.

Hannah touched his arm gently. "Neville, the...the Healers want to talk to you."

"Why me?" His voice was low and rough from not speaking. Gran had been here nearly twenty four hours now and he hadn't moved from her bed side once and had barely spoken during that time. Merlin, was it really twenty four hours? Just one day since they had gotten the Floo call telling them that his Gran was in St Mungo's desperately ill, it felt like longer, much longer. It felt like he had been here days, weeks, months perhaps. Time moved so slowly, so very slowly when all you had left to do was wait.

They had been eating breakfast, he remembered. They had both jumped up, when the face in the fire had disappeared, grabbing their wands and leaving everything else behind. Hannah had been back earlier, just for a few minutes, to fetch some clothes and to ensure that everything was alright at his Gran's place.

He hadn't moved once. He couldn't. He had to be here when she woke up.

"You're the next of kin." Hannah said softly.

"Oh." He said quietly. It was true. He was the only one she had left.

He managed to pull himself to his feet and make his way to the door. He paused, hand stretched to find the handle, what if she woke up?

Hannah smiled reassuringly for a brief second. "I'm here; if she wakes up I'll run and get you."

He nodded. "Thank you."

He made his way to the Healer's station. The Head Healer was a squat little woman with the beginnings of a moustache and a clipboard.

"Mr Longbottom?" She said, running a fat finger down her list on the clipboard. It paused about half way down. "Mrs Longbottom's grandson?"

He nodded. "That's me. You wanted to see me?"

"Yes, your wife came to see us but we can't talk to her because she isn't direct family." The woman explained.

Neville nodded numbly.

"We...we have a responsibility to warn you that we think it is extremely unlikely that your grandmother will regain consciousness."

The woman was talking but Neville didn't hear it. He didn't want to hear it. She had to be lying. She was making it all up. She was being stupid. His Gran was going to wake up and get better and be as strong and healthy and bossy as ever.

"N-no, you're wrong." He said fiercely. "She's going to wake up."

The Healer placed a pudgy hand on his shoulder soothingly. "I'm sorry Mr Longbottom, really I am. I just can't give you false hope. She's a very sick woman. She's fighting but I don't think she's going to win this battle. You should say your goodbyes while you have the chance. If you need to speak to a counsellor, we can get you an appointment with one of our hospital counsellors. If you need to make any...arrangements for afterwards, we would be happy to assist." The woman spoke courteously but with a sense of detachment. She had obviously seen this all too many times, she had become numb to the pain and the suffering and the death.

Death. Merlin. His Gran might die.

No! No, she wouldn't. She was a fighter, she'd fought her whole damned life, she wouldn't give up. She wouldn't. She wouldn't lose. She was going to fight her way back.

Neville managed to nod at the Healer. "I don't need help. She's going to be fine."

The Healer clucked her tongue softly but said nothing, he noted, however, that she made a mark by his Gran's name on her clipboard. He wondered for a split second what it said before concluding that he didn't even care.

He went back to the hospital room. Augusta had been such a frequent visitor, and contributor, to the hospital over the past years that they had given her a room to herself. It was quiet and calm and it had its own window. The bed was in the centre of the room with a little armchair on each side. In the corner was a wireless set, standing on a little table. There was a second little table on the left of her bed; he had conjured up some flowers (yellow tulips – her favourites) to place atop it.

Hannah sat in one of the chairs, leaning forwards to murmur softly to his Gran. He paused at the door, just watching his wife and his Gran. He felt a surge of love for Hannah. She was quite clearly more than a little intimidated by his grandmother (to be honest, most people were) but here she was pleading with her to get better.

He stepped back from the door, leaning on the wall to the right of it. It felt cool against his hands. He wanted to go in but he didn't want to interrupt Hannah. She obviously had things to say to his Gran and she would be embarrassed if he eavesdropped or walked in.

He closed his eyes for a second, more tired than he had realised. He had stayed awake all night, Hannah had fallen asleep in her chair (which he had carefully Transfigured into a camp bed so she would be more comfortable) but he had remained sitting bolt upright and getting coffee every two hours. He was on a caffeine come down now though. He would have to sleep at some point.

When Gran was awake, probably. Hannah had sent an owl to his manager and had received a reply telling him he could have as long off as he needed. He could be here all day every day until she got better.

He peered into the door again and saw Hannah sitting back in her chair, gazing absent mindedly out of the window. He pressed down on the door handle and stepped in.

"Hey, what did the Healer want?" Hannah asked in her soft tone.

"Nothing much." Neville lied.

Hannah's lips tightened for a second but she said nothing. She always knew when he was lying. She had a way of making him confess the truth without actually doing anything. Something in her eyes, the way she held herself, the shape of her lips...it just made him confess.

"Fine." He yelled. "They think she's going to die, okay!" He understood that he was taking it out on the wrong person but he couldn't make himself care enough to stop. "They think she can't win this fight but they're wrong! Wrong! She's okay, she'll be fine!"

He finished, breathing heavily. Hannah flew to his side and hugged him tightly. He was shaking, he found, uncontrollably. He had no control of his own body – hands shaking, tears running down his face, large ugly sobs ripping from his throat. He was falling apart.

This was different to the other times. He had begun to fall apart a few times before. He had always managed to pull himself back and regain control though. This time was different, this time he had no control, he was falling apart and he was powerless to stop it.

Hannah carefully pushed him into a chair, resting lightly on his lap. He pulled her tighter, too tight perhaps, but she didn't complain. She sat there, her lips murmuring inaudible words against his shoulder as he cried and cried and cried, his tears soaking through her shirt and forming a huge damp patch on her shoulder.

Perhaps he managed to quieten down some, perhaps she began to talk louder, perhaps he was focusing more on what she was saying, either way at some point he began to hear what she was saying. Her words soothed him.

"It's alright. We're safe now, we're okay. I'm here, I'm always here, I'll always be here. It's okay, we'll get through this."

He managed to nod. They would get through this, of course they would.


	64. Dean and Pansy 4

**A/N: A Dean and Pansy chapter for Rosiline, Lady Eleanor Boleyn, FaithfulHPReader, Claratrix LeChatham and Reader-1996.**

**Slight confession, George and Luna is the most requested but I haven't decided what to write about them yet so when inspiration strikes (or if someone has an amazing idea stick it in a review), I will write them.**

**IMPORTANT: This is a continuation of the previous chapter.**

**Disclaimer: Bla, bla bla, HP...ain't mine.**

Dean x Pansy  
The Ministry

_"We have heard both sides and now we will vote. All those in favour of dissolving the contract please raise your hands now..."_

_Dean squeezed his eyes tightly shut for a second and allowed himself to hope. This was it – freedom or Parkinson. Merlin, please please please._

He managed to peel his eyes open. Hands were being raised around the room. Every single witch, although they were significantly outnumbered by the wizards, had her arm in their air. More hands were going up. More and more.

Kingsley's, he noted, was firmly down. A few of Kingsley's closest colleagues had kept theirs down as well.

He couldn't count how many hands were up but there were a lot of wizards who hadn't raised their hands.

Merlin.

"And now, those in favour of the enforcement of the marriage contract between Mr Thomas and Miss Parkinson please raise your hands now."

It was close, dangerously close, too close for Dean to call. It was about half and half. He tried to calm down his breathing, concentrating on taking a breath in and exhaling, in and out.

He just had to hope that it had swung in his favour. Please, please, please.

The head of the Wizengamot nodded once and the raised arms were lowered. The whole room waited in absolute silence for the verdict to be given. "By a narrow margin, very narrow indeed, the marriage contract has been dissolved."

Dean blinked.

He'd won! He'd won! He was free.

A few of the Wizengamot broke out into hastily stifled applause. Kingsley looked thunderous.

The man continued speaking in an unruffled tone. "However, there are still a few unmarried participants in the scheme. You will be reassigned and will be given the names of your new partners tomorrow." He tapped his gavel loudly against the desk and the Wizengamot was dismissed.

Some, like Kingsley, left immediately. A few began gossiping amongst themselves. The room slowly but steadily began to clear. Pansy swept out imperiously, her lawyer following in her shadow like an obedient dog.

Dean got slowly to his feet and walked outside. Seamus was standing right by the door.

"Did you win?" He said excitedly. "C'mon, don't hold out on me here. Just tell me."

Dean grinned, "Oh hell yeah I won."

Seamus laughed and hugged his best friend, punching him on the shoulder. "Thank Merlin, mate. Now, time to celebrate?"

Dean stared at him. "Did you even have to ask?"

-

"I won! I won!" Dean cried, wobbling precariously and just managing to stay on his stool.

"He won! Freedom. Long live freedom! To freedom!" Seamus held up his pint, a little worse for wear. Dean grinned happily and clinked his own glass against Seamus'.

"Freedom!" Dean echoed. He hadn't seemed to have noticed that half the contents of his glass had been spilled across his hand and most of the bar top.

The barman was watching them with an amused expression. Business had been slow lately, not much call for drinking and merriment in times like these, but he was doing a roaring trade off of these two.

"M-mate." Seamus said seriously, ruining the effect somewhat by hiccupping loudly. "What will happen now?"

"Ah well...." Dean slurred, taking another huge gulp of his drink. "I will get anover wife!"

"Another one?" Seamus said.

"Yup." Dean said cheerfully. "Someone else...someone better."

"Much much better!" Seamus agreed.

"To better wife!" Dean cried holding up his pint again. Seamus banged his glass against Dean's and grinned happily.

-

Dean opened one eye and moaned loudly. He closed it again. It felt like someone had sliced the top of his head off. The morning light was burning through his closed eyelids. His head was pounding; as if some particularly malicious soul was playing drums inside his brain.

He managed to open his eyes and squinted dramatically until his eyes adjusted to the light. He noticed that he was still wearing exactly what he had been last night, including his shoes.

He wondered idly exactly how he had gotten home. He certainly hadn't walked and there was no way he could have Apparated. Presumably Seamus had brought him home, although...Seamus had been just as drunk as he was. He pushed the thought away, probably best not to think about it.

He managed to stand up, remove his shoes and shuffle to the bathroom. He winced at his own reflection in the mirror. Heavy drinking did not do much for the appearance. Dark shadows under bloodshot eyes, a fine coating of dark stubble, which seemed to have suddenly sprouted overnight, and eerily pale skin. Nice. Real nice.

He splashed his face with cool water. It felt good. He found Muggle Paracetamol in the bathroom cupboard and took two. They didn't have much of an effect but, right then, he couldn't have cared less.

Suddenly, there was a loud tapping. He groaned softly, it hurt his pounding head. He found the source of the noise after a few moments of blind scrabbling and loud swearing – an owl was knocking on his window.

He opened it and glared furiously at the creature as it settled self importantly on his windowsill and stuck it's leg out.

With clumsy fingers, he took the letter and it flew off.

"Stupid bird." He muttered, leaving the letter on the side and going into his tiny kitchen where he poured himself a large glass of water.

He took gentle sips, sitting on the sofa. Last night was beginning to come back to him, little bits and pieces, memories were appearing in his mind.

He could remember winning the trial and going out with Seamus to celebrate. The bar had been pretty dead, he recalled, he and Seamus had been drinking pints of lager. Lots of them, he winced.

He could vaguely remember singing along in a very out of tune voice to the wireless and for some reason he could recall doing shots. Double vodka shots. A fair few of them. He shuddered.

Then, he remembered something the Chief of the Wizengamot had said.

He was going to be rematched and would find out the name of his wife today. The owl! He got up slowly, still wary of the fact that his head was likely to explode pending any sudden or hasty movements, and retrieved the letter.

He unfurled it carefully and read through.

"Dear Mr Thomas,

Following your successful appeal and subsequent dissolving of your former Marriage contract, we have reassigned you a new partner. We ask that you, and your new partner, report to the Marriage offices at the Ministry as soon as possible to complete the relevant paperwork and finalise a date for your marriage.

As the former date for all marriages to be completed has elapsed, we will give you one month to marry your new partner.

Your new marriage partner is: Lavender Brown.

Yours,

Mr M. Isery

On behalf of The Ministry of Magic"

-

Pansy swept out of the courtroom, elated by her victory. She handed a bag of money containing his fee and then some, over to her lawyer, dismissing him. She had no further use for his services. She was free now, free of that awful Mudblood. The things he had said about her! How dare he! The looks the Wizengamot had given her – she had wanted to curl up and die, how could they say things like that about her. It wasn't true, not at all.

Her parents would be pleased though, they had been horrified to discover that she had been matched with a Muggleborn.

She would be matched with someone else now. A Pureblood possessing good looks, fine breeding, a very rich family, money, lots of it, a fine mansion for her to live, a good name, aristocratic connections. Oh yes, her new husband would be someone worthy of her, a Parkinson.

She was from a good family. She deserved a good match, someone who would make her parents proud and enhance their name. She needed a good match, her parents would never forgive her if she married someone lesser.

They might even cut her off. She wouldn't be able to cope with that. She had never worked before, she wasn't very intelligent, didn't have many qualifications. She would never survive without her inheritance. Without her inheritance, she would have nothing. No money, no home, no possessions. Her friends would probably desert her, she would fall out of her Pureblood world.

She belonged in that world, she couldn't function in any other. She had been raised to fit in with other Purebloods. The manners, the clothes, the etiquette, the way of speaking, the walk – everything, she had been schooled in every single detail of Pureblood ways, just like every other Pureblood girl was.

She had to marry someone Pureblooded, she needed to make a good match. She simply had to. The loophole was closed now, she had no way out of any prospective marriage if the match was a bad one.

She told her parents the news and went up to bed early, forgoing dinner in favour of sleep. Not that she slept that much, she tossed and turned the whole night and when she did manage to sleep, she had nightmares. Nightmares of being cut off and disowned and turned out.

She woke up in the morning looking a little worse for wear. Her eyes were puffy and circled with dark shadows.

She waited impatiently for the owl bringing her the name of her new husband. Meanwhile she summoned a House Elf, her personal one, and ordered her to begin preparing a bath and to lay out some clothes for her. She should get ready before doing anything else, her tutor had drummed this into her several times. Purebloods were always immaculately dressed and prepared.

She bathed quickly and used a Concealment Charm to ensure her eyes looked fresh and less tired. She dressed in simple black robes with a plain black dress underneath. She magically straightened her hair so it hung in a neat bob, the ends turned under tidily.

The owl had arrived already. Her House Elf always took the letters and left them on her dressing table. She sat down at the little table and picked up the letter.

Slowly and carefully, she undid the scroll.

"Dear Miss Parkinson,

Following your successful appeal and subsequent dissolving of your former Marriage contract, we have reassigned you a new partner. We ask that you, and your new partner, report to the Marriage offices at the Ministry as soon as possible to complete the relevant paperwork and finalise a date for your marriage.

As the former date for all marriages to be completed has elapsed, we will give you one month to marry your new partner.

Your new marriage partner is: Lee Jordan.

Yours,

Mr M. Isery

On behalf of The Ministry of Magic"

-


	65. Oliver and Alicia 5

A/N: **Oliver and Alicia for Whisperheart, Tik Tok On The Block, lovenotwarXo, Rainy Summer, aribaconpolarcat and annouska.**

**IMPORTANT, PLEASE READ! Hey guys, I was looking over this story today and realised that certain pairings have been way more popular and therefore got a lot more written about them. Blaise and Hermione have eight whole chapters about them whereas couples like Fred and Angelina only have three. (My theory is that the unhappiest couples seem to get the most requests – clearly you guys like the hatred part!) **

**This seemed pretty unfair to me, so ****until further notice I am going to work on some of the more neglected couples****. I want to get up to at least five chapters for each pairing. **

**You are still absolutely allowed to request**** (even for those couples that I'm not currently writing, I will still keep note and will get round to writing them) and the couples that get requested the most, out of the ones I am writing, will still get written first.**

**Here are the current couples I am writing:  
****- ****Seamus and Parvati  
- ****Percy and Cho  
****- Fred and Angelina  
- ****Neville and Hannah  
- ****Dean and Lavender  
- ****Lee and Pansy.**

Oliver x Alicia  
Hogsmeade

'_Alicia,_

_I came to Hogwarts last night and you didn't show. I thought we were okay now._

_Write back,_

_Oliver'_

-

'_Alicia,_

_You still haven't written back and I know you got my letter. Please, just agree to meet tonight. We're breaking the Law, they might revoke my Quidditch license and then I won't be able to play._

_Oliver'_

-

'_To Alicia,_

_This is the last letter I'm bothering to write. We're breaking the Law and I can't afford to do that. I'm a law abiding citizen. You think I want this anymore than you do? I know that we don't see eye to eye on everything and that you don't care for me much and I'll apologise again for hurting your feelings in that stupid interview. Merlin I'll even give another interview apologising publicly if that's what you want._

_We have to do this Alicia. It's the Law. I thought we were friends, albeit married ones. Come on, please, just write back. _

_I know it's a Hogsmeade weekend this Saturday. I've got training first thing but we could meet for lunch._

_Write back,_

_Oliver'_

-

Three letters. She had received three more letters since the one she had burned. She had read these ones though and found herself regretting the decision to burn the first one. She wanted to know what he had said.

She really did need to learn to control her temper, it got her into difficult situations. She tended to do stupid, reckless things when she was angry. She couldn't help it – the anger took over and she ended up seeing red.

The first two letters she had simply read and ignored. The third one, however, had gotten to her, just a little. It was honest and simple.

He was right – they were breaking the Law and it was her fault. She didn't want to get into trouble or have him be arrested or something. Hell, he could lose his Quidditch licence if he was found to be breaking the Law, that would erase his whole career...she wasn't stubborn enough to ruin his life, was she?

She had once gotten on with Oliver – of course she had respected him as her team Captain but they had also been friends, not especially close ones but friends nonetheless.

She owed this much to him. She would meet him for lunch, give him a chance. Perhaps they could renew their friendship, slowly, perhaps even get to know each other a little. They hadn't really talked about things. They had had that first Ministry meeting and afterwards had coffee together, they'd talked a little then but he was still reeling from shock and she was sobbing for most of it. Since then she couldn't remember talking, really talking with him.

Sure they said hey and asked about each other's days, light stuff, a prelude before they went to the bedroom chambers, did the deed and went their separate ways. It certainly wasn't the stuff of fairytales.

She wasn't in love with Oliver. She knew that. She wasn't even sure if she liked him or not. But, she was married to him and she should give him a chance.

She wrote back just eight words.

'_Lunch in Hogsmeade on Saturday. See you there.'_

-

Saturday dawned, cold, crisp and bright.

She had been, rather pathetically, kind of looking forward to lunch. She hadn't had a chance to go out on a date (although, this wasn't technically a date) for a long time now.

She had decided that she wanted to make a go of this, whatever they were now. It had dawned on her that she wasn't going to be getting out of this marriage anytime soon. She wasn't going to get that perfect life with the loving marriage. However, her and Oliver had been friends once, they could still be friends. Perhaps, with time and effort, they could begin to like each other more romantically.

He would be the father of her children... she needed to make at least some effort.

She didn't want her children to grow up knowing that their parents hated each other's guts. Ideally, she never wanted her children to know why and how their parents were married. Her children didn't need to know that. They should know that their parents loved each other, liked each other, respected each other. They should have their parents living under the same roof, sharing a bed, getting on. They should never have to hear their parents have a blazing row or badmouth each other.

They deserved that much.

Her generation were battle hardened with shattered dreams and unhappy, enforced marriages. Her parent's generation had fought through the First Wizarding War – the bloodiest and most dangerous war in the history of wizardkind.

Her children's generation were the future. They should be safe and happy and loved. They should be able to finish school. They should never have to fear for their lives. They should never have to feel the pain of having someone they know die. They should never have to fight for a free world. They should be able to marry whom they chose.

Some of them, the lucky ones, would grow up with parents that loved each other. Some of them would end up caught in the middle of a hated marriage, she knew of soon to be parents (like Hermione whom she had begun to befriend) who hated the very idea of their offspring, although she did think Hermione's feelings would change when she saw the baby. She knew of couples who would use their children to get back at each other. She knew that some children would grow up with the knowledge that they were unwanted.

She never wanted her children to feel that.

She wanted to give her kids a good future. If that meant that along the way she had to bite her tongue a few times and give Oliver a few chances, well...she'd do it.

-

Oliver had owled her the Saturday morning asking to meet in the Three Broomsticks about half twelve. She had sent a quick reply back.

Sure enough, half past twelve saw Alicia sitting at a table in the little inn. Alone. She had given him ten minutes; after all he could just be running a bit late.

She had felt awkward waiting, stupid...like she'd been stood up. She had fidgeted nervously, wondering what to do and feeling like everybody was staring at her. They probably weren't, she just felt conspicuous, sitting by herself at a table clearly for two. Finally, she had ordered a drink and sipped and sipped and sipped until it was gone. Then she'd bought another.

By half past one, she was beginning to get angry. Real angry. The prat had stood her up! Fifteen minutes was late, an hour was just plain ridiculous. She wondered whether she should just leave. Then she'd have to walk out of here alone, she'd look a fool.

He dashed in at a quarter to two.

"Sorry I'm late!" He'd said cheerfully, sitting down in the chair opposite her and picking up a menu.

"Late?" She'd said slowly. "Late is ten minutes, Oliver, not a bloody hour and a quarter!"

"Training ran late, sorry." He said. "I couldn't get away any sooner."

"You could have owled or something! I've been sat here like a prize idiot." He wasn't getting off that lightly, she was angry at him and hurt and humiliated.

Oliver sighed dramatically. "Calm down, it's no big deal."

"No big deal!" She echoed a little hysterically. She got up and stormed out, knowing that everyone was staring at her, but not quite managing to care, and pulling her jacket on as she did so.

The cold outside made her want to gasp, she hadn't realised how warm it had been inside. She began marching her way back up to the castle when she noticed that Oliver was following her, keeping up easily – one stride of his matching every three of hers.

Look Lissy, I thought we were cool, I thought we were making a new start."

"We were!" She yelled. "Until you stood me up."

People were staring at the two of them with smirks and shocked looks and interested expressions. She glared at a few of the closest who promptly looked away, abashed.

"I did not stand you up! I'm here, aren't I?" He yelled back, angered now. In a perverse way, she was pleased he was all riled up, now he knew how she felt.

"Why do you always have to say that like it's some huge ordeal! I'm your wife for Merlin's sake, why does it have to be such an effort to come and see me?"

He grabbed her by the arm, she whirled around angrily to face him. She opened her mouth to speak but he cut her off.

"Because it is! It's a bloody long way and after a hard day training the last thing I want to do is slog over here to see the girl I was forced to marry!"

She glared daggers at him. "Why do you always make this about you? You think I wanted to marry you! It wasn't my choice either and all you do is make this hard, it could be alright but no, you screw everything up!" She waved her arms about in the air as she spoke, narrowly missing him a few times, and looking like a mad woman. She didn't care.

"You screwed this up!" He yelled back, taking a step towards her.

She laughed once mockingly. "I messed this up? I did? It's you, it's always you!"

Then, she did something really really stupid.

Looking back on it later, she would plead it was a heat of the moment thing, she always did do stupid things when she was mad. She would say that the charms took over and influenced her actions. Tell truth, she wasn't that sure if it was the charms or an anger thing, she didn't know what it was or where the hell it came from.

She kissed him.

He froze, for a long moment, and then kissed her back.

_Merlin, god, oh why did I do that? _Her mind screamed._ What do I do now?_

They pulled apart, breathing quickened and eyes bright with passion and rage.

"Urm." Oliver said awkwardly.

"Yeah." Alicia said, shuffling her feet.

Chivalry kicked in. "Sorry." Oliver said.

Alicia giggled, despite herself. "I kiss you and you apologise?"

Oliver grinned. "Yeah, twisted huh? Erm...you want to...get some lunch?"

She raised an eyebrow. "Because that worked so well the first time?"

He nodded. "Fair play, but...we could make this work, Alicia. We are married, whether we like it or not. What d'you say that we make a go of this?"

She nodded dumbly, he offered her his hand and without thinking, she took it. Maybe another chance wouldn't be such a bad thing.


	66. Dean and Lavender 1

**A/N: Dean and Lavender for , lovenotwarXo and Kris 77. A little on the short side, sorry! Please keep reviewing and requesting (:**

**Disclaimer: Not mine, no siree.**

Dean x Lavender  
Muggle London

She hadn't really known what to do with herself. She didn't have a job or a family or friends. Everyone else her age was going back to school to get good grades, getting jobs and marrying.

She had nothing.

She was alone and forgotten. She spent whole days by herself with no human interaction. She had no reason to leave her flat, no reason to even get out of bed. Sometimes she found it easier just to stay in bed all day. After all, no one would miss her, no one would wonder where she was, she had nowhere to be.

Her only friend was Cho, although, she suspected that Cho only spoke to her because she was lonely and she, Lavender, was the only person available. Parvati, her long term best friend, never spoke to her, hadn't in a long while. They'd argued a while back, when she, Lavender, was obsessed with fame and publicity and didn't have time for friends or anything that didn't have a price tag attatched to it.

She'd been stupid, she knew that now. She'd made mistakes, a lot of them, some of them she could never put right. She didn't know how to even begin fixing her life up again.

The media had lost interest in her a long time ago. She hadn't cared much, by that time she had lost interest in the whole stupid, fake charade. She just wanted her old life back.

She missed days at Hogwarts, when Parvati was still her best friend and the War hadn't happened yet and no one her age was married back when her biggest concern was the amount of homework she had and she didn't have to think about how alone she was or how her friends all hated her or how she had messed up or how she didn't even have enough money to pay this month's rent.

She had been surprised when the Ministry letter had came. She had thought she had been forgotten. She hadn't expected a second husband. She didn't even deserve another chance.

She had expected someone awful or mean or vile or a combination of the three. After all, to still be single meant that their former fiancée had killed themselves or ran off to join a resistance group or something. That probably said something about the kind of person they were.

She had gotten Dean Thomas. He wasn't awful or mean or vile. In fact, he was a pretty good guy. She had always gotten on well with him. When Seamus and Parvati had liked each other but not wanted to say anything, back in the Hogwarts days, their respective best friends, her and Dean, had been thrown together a lot. She had found that she actually quite liked Dean. He was kind and funny and talented.

They hadn't really spoken since the Final Battle. She vaguely remembered hugging him afterwards, along with just about everyone else, and saying she was glad he was okay. She hadn't spoken to him since. She had been curious about why he was unmarried.

He was a good guy. Surely the thought of marrying him wouldn't drive a girl to jump off a cliff. He was nice, she wouldn't mind marrying him.

It would be weird, sure, but it would be okay. Perhaps they would be alright.

He was a good person, he deserved to marry someone who was equally as good. She wasn't a good person. He deserved someone who was better than she was – someone who was nice and kind and loving, someone who loved him, someone who was his equal.

It would take a long time before she could be that girl, perhaps once, a long time ago, she had been that girl. Perhaps she could try and be that girl again, someone who deserved a second chance, perhaps.

-

He read those two words again. "Lavender Brown."

He smiled with relief. Lavender was a lot better than Pansy. A lot lot better. He had expected to be matched with someone awful but Lavender was nice. They'd been friends back in school. There hadn't been many Gryffindors in their year group and Ron, Harry and Hermione had kept pretty much to themselves. They'd spent a lot of time as a four, particularly when Seamus and Parvati had been together, well, kind of together anyway.s

He wouldn't mind marrying Lavender. She was nice and pretty and funny. He'd heard some unfavourable things about her and how she had behaved towards Harry. But then, he wasn't Harry, he certainly wasn't famous. Perhaps she would be less...publicity seeking.

He didn't like girls like that – the ones who just wanted to be famous despite their lack of talent. He hoped that Lavender would put that part of her life behind her. He didn't want his wife and the mother of his children to be like that. It was weird to think of her like that. In his mind she was still blonde Lavender who sometimes said stupid things but was pretty clever underneath all that, the Lavender who hated Potions lessons because the dungeons scared her a little and once stayed up all night writing a Transfiguration essay with him.

Weird to think that Lavender Brown was going to be his wife...

It wouldn't be so bad though. He could marry Lavender, pretty happily. It would be just like old times – the four of them again, Parvati and Lavender had been best friends at school and so had he and Seamus. It would be perfect.

He smiled with satisfaction. Life had just gotten a whole lot better.

-

They had arranged to meet for lunch in a little Muggle restaurant. Both had admitted a preference for Muggle establishments over wizarding ones. The food tended to be better.

They had met outside, exchanged shy hellos and half smiles before going inside. A very smiley waitress with a high ponytail that bobbed as she walked had led them to a table and taken their orders.

"So, what're you doing now? You're not at Hogwarts, are you?" Lavender broke the silence.

"No, I couldn't face going back. I'm working at the Ministry – Department of Magical Sports and Games." He'd never fancied working for the Ministry. He'd thought it would be dull. Then he'd found out about some of the more exciting stuff you could do there and gotten an internship, they'd been so impressed with him they'd offered him a job.

She nodded, "Sounds good. I didn't go back either, just didn't want to."

He paused and tried to hide some of the disapproval from his tone as he spoke, "Parvati said you didn't go back because you wanted to be...famous?"

She blushed. "Yeah. Erm. That was the reason. Only now, well...I'm trying to be someone different now. I didn't like who I was, all about image and fame."

Dean smiled tentatively and echoed her earlier words. "Sounds good."

"Have you spoken to Parvati? How's she doing?" Lavender said eagerly.

Dean frowned slightly. "Well, not for a while. I saw them in Hogsmeade the other weekend, just for a few hours. I can't believe she's pregnant."

"She's pregnant?" Lavender said quietly.

Dean nodded. "Didn't you know?"

"Parvati and I aren't really...speaking, anymore." Lavender spoke to the table.

"How come?" Dean's vision of the four of them double dating, being best friends, going to each other's for long dinners and late Sunday lunches, raising their kids together, flickered slightly.

"Well, she didn't like who I was either." Lavender admitted. "I was stupid, I lost her and I shouldn't have."

"So write to her," Dean said a little impatiently. "You two were best friends for seven years, that sort of friendship doesn't just go. Write to her, tell her you're sorry and that you're trying to change. She'll forgive you."

"You think?" Lavender said softly, trying not to hope.

Dean nodded. "I do."

Lavender flashed him a quick, shy smile. Dean smiled back.

"So," Lavender began. "Why aren't you married yet?"

"I was engaged to Pansy Parkinson." Dean said gravely. Lavender couldn't help herself – a small giggle escape. "Don't laugh. It was terrifying."

Lavender fought for control for a few moments and then, pressing her lips together managed to nod. "Go on, how'd you escape?"

Dean grinned, "Well, I found this loophole and used it."

"A loophole?" Lavender said. "I didn't think one existed."

"It doesn't, not anymore. The Ministry closed it just after I put my application in. Luckily, the Law still stood and we got a court hearing. The Wizengamot took pity on us and freed me."

"I'm glad they did." Lavender said fervently then her expression turned gleeful. "Otherwise you would have had to marry Parkinson."

Dean shuddered theatrically. "Yeah, I really wasn't looking forward to that part. I think it'll be better being married to you." He offered unexpectedly.

Lavender flushed a faint pink. "I hope so."

-

**A/N: I was wondering what you thought about Lavender – do you think she's really changed? Do you think she deserves a second chance? What do you think should happen with her and Dean? Let me know!**


	67. Fred and Angelina 4

**A/N: Fred and Angelina for ShinoHina4eva and Reader-1996. Please keep reading, reviewing and requesting!**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter.**

Fred x Angelina  
Their Flat

She flopped back on the sofa and moaned irritably.

"Erm...ouch." Fred said, a little pathetically. "That was my stomach." She sent him a death glare and he shut up abruptly.

"I'm having a bad day."

"What's wrong, babe?" He said, wrapping a reassuring arm around her.

"I...erm...I think I might be pregnant."

He bit his lip. "Erm... and that's a bad thing, because?"

"Because I never really wanted kids and the Ministry is insisting on at least three and it's going to hurt and I don't even know how to be a mum and anyway, I don't want to share you with anyone else, not even our child." She said this all in one breath, the words running into each other in their haste to escape.

Fred stifled laughter, remembering that it was best not to antagonise Angelina Johnson. Weasley actually, he reminded himself. She was Angelina Weasley now. She was his forever, tied to him by marriage and love, she was his.

The Fred Weasley of old didn't have thoughts like this. The old Fred Weasley was smooth and suave and had more than a few girlfriends. This Fred Weasley was a blubbering pathetic heap of romance and paranoia and love. This Fred Weasley pandered to Angelina's every whim and made soppy professions of love. This Fred Weasley was utterly and pathetically whipped. Nice.

He thought very carefully about his choice of words, mindful of the fact that her wand was in her pocket and that his was on the kitchen table. "I know that we have to have children by law, but don't you want them? Because I do. I knew from the second we were matched, even before I knew for certain that I loved you, which I do by the way, that I wanted you to have my children."

She blushed at his words, praying that her skin was too dark for him to tell. He knew, of course, he always did. He grinned hugely in response.

"But, I don't know how to be a mum." She said, a little despairingly. "What if it turns out awful?"

"To be honest with you love, its' father is going to be me and its' godfather and uncle will be George. It doesn't have a chance in hell."

She sighed acknowledging the truth of his words. This poor child was going to be corrupted from birth. It would be a tricking, pranking, joking machine, like Fred and George all rolled into one person. Merlin, help her, help them all.

She hoped it would turn out rather like Percy, just to spite the twins. She smiled with a slightly vindictive satisfaction. "Guess I'll have to be the good parent then."

Fred nodded ruefully. "Sorry babe. The bad, corrupting influence parent role is mine."

She narrowed her eyes. "So you are putting the responsibility of making sure our child turns out half decent in my hands?"

"Pretty much. From my side, it will get dashing good looks, heaps of charm, red hair and freckles, naturally, and excellent pranking skills. And half of a first rate joke shop." He added as an afterthought.

Angelina snorted in an unattractive fashion. "Don't think much of yourself, do you?"

Fred adopted a solemn face. "Of course from your side, oh light of my life, sweetheart, my one and only love, the child will get beauty and intelligence and sarcasm, lots of sarcasm –ouch!" She'd punched his shoulder.

"Oh shut your face." She said good naturedly.

He rubbed his shoulder melodramatically, adopting a pained expression. She pointedly ignored him.

"Quite finished?" She said after a while.

He straightened up. "Yeah, so, where were we?"

"I don't want a baby." She reminded him.

"Why?"

"I've told you. I can't be a mum, I'll be rubbish at it. And it will hurt and I'll have to be huge for nine months."

"Okay, firstly...we're magic, remember? They can stop it hurting. And you won't be huge for nine months, you won't even show for ages and afterwards you will...you know...go

down again."

She nodded begrudgingly, admitting that he was right. She hated it when he was right, he was always so smug about it. Prat. Stupid, smug, always right, handsome, lovely prat.

She cursed her stupid, traitorous thoughts. They always managed to distract her and remind her exactly how much she loved him when all she wanted to do was hate him, just for a while. He made it impossible for him to hate her, he was so lovely to her, always making her feel good, and he was completely gorgeous, of course. And, to make it worse, he knew it.

"And," he continued. "You will be a fantastic mother."

"Won't." She muttered sulkily.

"You will. You're kind and patient and clever. You manage to look after me and I behave like a four year old most of the time." She nodded – that was true, she did do that.

"You stay calm, even when me and George charmed the cooker to smoke whenever you cooked."

She frowned, remembering the incident. Her 'charming' husband and his twin had placed a spell on their oven so that thick, black smoke poured from it whenever she began cooking, she would frantically pull it out, cursing furiously, only to find that the food was not burning, not in the slightest. It had taken her two days to work out what had happened and a further three to remove it. (Technically, she had had Fred remove it. She had stopped cooking and eventually hunger got the better of him.)

He continued. "You'd be a really good mum."

She half nodded. "Maybe."

"Definitely." He promised, kissing her chastely on the lips.

"You're really – really - good at distractions." She managed as he peppered light kisses onto her cheeks, her lips, her neck. She hadn't even realised her eyelids had fluttered closed until she felt his lips against them. They flew open to see him grinning smugly.

"I know." He said. "It's a gift, I'm just too darn attractive for my own good." He smirked.

She swatted at his chest irritably. He was right, again, but there was no way she was acknowledging that one. His head was big enough as it was.

"Let's talk about names!" He cried suddenly.

She groaned loudly. "No."

"What? Why?" He looked like a small child who had been told Christmas was cancelled that year.

Despite herself, she found herself wanting to give in. _No Angelina, fight back_, a little voice said fiercely.

"Because I don't want to talk about names until the child is in my arms." She replied firmly.

"But what if we can't think of anything? It takes a long time to think of a name for our child, I mean...the kid's saddled with that name forever, it'll take time to make sure we get it right. We won't have time when we actually have it, but right now...well we've got nine whole months."

She pulled a face. "Okay, okay. Stupid, irresistible prat."

"That's me." He grinned cheerfully.

"Okay, you think of names and I'll give my opinion." She leaned back against the arm of the sofa, placing her legs across his lap.

He nodded, "Right...Winifred."

"Why on earth would you want to call a child that?"

"Because...it would be practically named after me! Wini-fred!"

"No."

He looked a little deflated for a brief moment but then perked up again. "Fredwina!"

She was torn between a desire to laugh and the urge to scream. She stifled both, managing to say in a relatively calm tone. "We are not naming our child after you."

"Oh." He pouted miserably. "Okay, what about Roxy?"

"Roxanne. Roxy's a nickname." Angelina said absent mindedly. She hated it when people were christened names which were actually nicknames.

"Yeah, I like Roxanne."

"Okay, well if we have a girl it can be Roxanne." Angelina said.

Fred paused, "But what if she doesn't look like a Roxanne. We should have...a back up. Just in case."

Angelina sighed. "Okay, okay."

"We're gonna need four names then. At least."

She nodded. "Yes. We've got one. Can't we leave this discussion for another time...there's still nine months and we've got one out of four."

He shook his head. "No way. What about... Emma?"

"I have a cousin called Emma. Hate her."

"Right." He thought for a moment. "Sam."

"For a girl or a boy?"

"Either."

"No." She said. "It's a boy's name. And I don't like Samuel."

"Well that's why I'm saying Sam." He pointed out.

"Sam isn't a name. It's a nickname."

"No, it isn't." He disagreed.

She frowned at him. "Yes it is. Sam isn't a real name. People are called Sam because their real name is Samuel and that is quite long and people want to shorten it!"

"No." He said simply.

"It is!"

"Not."

She wanted to punch his stupidly handsome face in. He always knew how to antagonise her, to get her mad, he got under her skin like no other person. And yet, she didn't care. She didn't care because he always calmed her down again, usually shutting her up with a kiss in a move that was incredibly cliché and yet worked a treat, and of course, because she just happened to be head over heels in love with him even if he was the biggest idiot around.

"No one is called Sam, people are called Sam-" He cut her off with a kiss, she sighed inwardly and then responded, naturally. She just couldn't help herself. When it came to him, she was putty in his hands.

And he knew it.


	68. Lee and Pansy 1

**A/N: For thedevilandgod, annouska, ShinoHina4eva and Whisperheart.**

**IMPORTANT: I have changed my pen name. I was cullenchick25-x. I am now megg.x**

**Also: references to suicide. Don't say I didn't warn you.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. **

Lee x Pansy

Oh Merlin. Why? Why him? What had he done to deserve this?

Pansy sodding Parkinson.

It was...sickening at best, frightening at worst. She was awful, completely horrible. Dean Thomas had managed to get rid of her and now she was engaged to him.

He had no escape route this time. He had to marry that...thing. She was horrible; cruel, mean, nasty, Slytherin, hideous. He couldn't marry that.

Merlin, this was awful. Life couldn't get a lot worse.

He'd been shell shocked when he'd been matched with Ginny and then, much to his relief, she had run off with Harry and he thought he'd been safe. He'd gotten his best friends back – in fact, Fred and George had welcomed him back with open arms – and he'd been free to continue bachelorhood. Sure there were no pretty, young witches around at the moment but there were a whole lot of Muggle girls who were still single.

He'd sort of hoped he'd slipped off the Ministry's radar. He'd thought that he wouldn't have to marry; he'd thought he would marry a Muggle. That would be cool. He would get to choose the girl, he would be able to love her just because he wanted to, not because of the law or some stupid attraction charms. He'd thought that if he did, in fact, have to marry, he would be assigned some young thing that had just become legal. There was a whole new generation of young people who were coming up to the right age. He would be matched with one of them and that would probably end up okay.

Then he had gotten that letter, the one telling him that he was going to have to marry Pansy Parkinson.

He had read it through twice, nodded calmly and then Flooed Fred and George telling them he needed them. They had sympathised, expressed horror and then taken him out and got him completely and utterly out of his head on alcohol. They were pretty good friends really.

He had been able to drown his sorrows that night, to pretend, just for one evening, that this wasn't the worst thing that had ever happened to him. Luckily, he hadn't signed anything yet so he wasn't....attracted to it. Thank Merlin. He was dreading the time when he wanted that...thing.

It was going to be horrible, liking her pug like features.

It made him shudder and want to retch just thinking about it. About her. She wasn't even a nice person. It wasn't even really about her looks, it was about her in general. She was a horrible person. She was bad.

He had fought for the right side. He had kept morale up during the war, broadcasting illegally from various locations, he'd spent weeks, months, running from the Death Eaters and hiding in bunkers and crummy cabins out in the middle of nowhere. He deserved something good. Parkinson wasn't good.

He didn't deserve this! He was a good person, he had done good things. How could the Ministry betray him like this, betray them all?

He poured himself a generous measure of Firewhiskey and drained it in one gulp, relishing the burning trail the alcohol made down his throat. He blinked rapidly, feeling the alcohol take effect almost instantly. He poured out another glass, his hand a little shaky now, and drunk that one as well, a little slower this time now.

Fred and George weren't joining him tonight. He was alone in his flat, drowning his sorrows, trying to forget about it all and hoping that the answer lay at the bottom of the bottle.

He gave up on the glass and swigged straight from the bottle. He was a good halfway through now and Merlin, could he tell. He'd never been particularly great at holding his liquor, a fact the twins had teased him about mercilessly. It wouldn't take much for him to be drunk. Usually he hated this, today, right now, he didn't care. Not one bit. The faster he could get drunk, the quicker he would be able to forget.

He winced, still drinking, just thinking about the almighty hangover he would have in the morning. Ah well, he reasoned, it was worth it. Anything was worth it. He'd do anything to forget. Forgetting was key.

"To forgetting." He held up the bottle in a lone toast, taking another large gulp. He got to his feet and managed to put the wireless on. The Weird Sister's latest song blared to life and he grinned to himself.

Good music and lots of booze, his evening was going to be good. Shame he was alone, but hey, it didn't matter. He'd be fine by himself!

"Yeah. Don't need 'em." He said. "'S, gonna be good."

He took another mouthful of whisky, frowning when he realised he'd drunk the entire contents.

"Funny. I hadn't even noticed! Funny." He laughed. He wasn't sure what at, but everything sure seemed funnier tonight. Really funny.

He opened another bottle and took a gulp. It was nice really, once you got used to the taste, it was lovely. Bliss.

Heaven in a bottle.

He snickered to himself.

Suddenly, he was hit with an overwhelming hit of loneliness. He was all by himself getting drunk, alone, in his flat. Pathetic really. He didn't have anyone though. There was no one to talk to about things, no one could sort this mess out, no one cared enough to. His friends all loved their marriage partners, or at least could tolerate them enough to get by, they didn't care about him and his troubles.

Of course they felt sorry for him. They could do nothing about it though and pretty soon they would disappear, they could only give sympathy for so long. They had their own lives to get back to, their new husband and wives to spend time with, they didn't want him and his misery to hang out with them.

He would never be able to bring his new wife over to his friends. Luna, George's wife, fitted in with the rest seamlessly. She was a little...out there, sometimes but she still fitted in. Pansy would never go and spend long evenings at The Burrow with him and his friends. Hell he wouldn't even want her to go.

He would have to see her, of course he would. Three times a week or something like that. And until they had three children, they would have to stay married. There was no chance of the law being removed. They would be married, perhaps for life. They were in it for the long haul.

It was going to be horrible. Truly horrible.

There was no escape. Dean had used the only way out and that was closed now. There were few resistance groups still operating and there was no way of finding them. He could run but he would be found and thrown into Azkaban.

Was it worth braving prison to escape Parkinson?

A part of him thought it actually was. Luckily it wasn't a particularly large part. He was still reasonably sane. He wasn't going to do anything rash. He would think things over, perhaps when he wasn't so whisky addled and could think straight, and come to a rational decision.

Perhaps in the end he would end up marrying her. Perhaps he would find a way out. It would all depend on what he could come up with.

Even as he was thinking this through and pretending that he was going to be mature and sensible and reasonable about this, another part of his mind, a part which was steadily growing louder and louder, was coming up with another plan.

A plan which was hard but he had no other alternative. He had no choice, no way out. His life would be awful if he married Parkinson.

Terrible, in fact. Maybe, maybe it would be better if he just ended it all now...

His friends wouldn't care. They might be upset for a bit but in the long run it wouldn't make a whole lot of difference to them. They had their own lives and he wasn't a part of that anymore. His fiancée was awful. He had to escape her somehow and this was the only way. The only way.

Now, how to do it. He didn't have access to a gun or some other Muggle killing device. He'd never really fancied hanging, too messy. Maybe a quick Avada, straight at his own heart.

Yeah, that was probably the best way. Quick, easy, painless.

He got up abruptly and walked into the bathroom. He turned on the taps and watched the water gush out. He splashed some on his face. It felt good, cleansing. It was sobering as well or perhaps the alcohol was beginning to leave his system. Either way his mind sharpened just a fraction.

His plan was set. He wavered over a suicide note. It was a little cliché, tell truth. And anyway, what was he supposed to say?

Still, he did like the idea of saying a final goodbye. It appealed to his morbid side. It would tell people why he died, why he did what he did. It would maybe explain away some of the confusion over his decision to die.

It was hard to write. Everyone said that. It was true, it was really difficult to write and he still didn't know if he got it right in the end.

'_Hey,_

_Sorry about this but it's the only way. I can't do this, I can't marry her. I'll miss you, all of you. _

_I hope your lives are amazing, you deserve it._

_Lee.'_

It was a bit short, he thought critically scanning it over. Maybe he should add a bit more in.

He was stalling, he knew that much. He didn't really want to do this but it was the only way. He couldn't marry her and there was no way out of this life.

Time to commit the deed. He, Lee Jordan, was going to take his own life. Woah, this was...unexpected.

He'd always thought his life would be pretty good. Finish up at Hogwarts and get a job as a Quidditch commentator, marry some pretty girl, have a few kids, stay friends with the twins, Angelina, Katie and Alicia, send the sproglets off to Hogwarts and spend his days reminiscing about Quidditch players he had met and going on long holidays with his beloved wife. The good life.

His life had taken a few twists and turns and deviations from this general ideal. The war, for one thing, and the Marriage Law - those two events had shaken up the plan a little. When Ginny had run off, he'd thought it would get back on track. It had, for a while, he'd had a brief, tantalising glimpse of what life could be like before it had been brutally snatched away. He had been left with just one option.

Suddenly, his eyes were drinking in the sight of his flat, roaming over every item of furniture, every insignificant detail. He decided that he didn't want his last sight to be his flat. He wanted to look outside. He kneeled clumsily on the sofa and opened the curtains. On a sudden whim, he opened the window. A cool breeze blew in, ruffling the curtains and his hair. He could see twinkling stars and a half moon. He took a deep breath and drew his wand.

He'd never cursed himself before. It was oddly difficult to turn his wand round to himself. His hand was shaking, pathetic really. He took another deep breath, his last on this earth perhaps.

_Goodbye..._

**A/N: The end of Lee Jordan? **


	69. Percy and Cho 5

**A/N: Percy and Cho for lovenotwarXo, sonea9 and mishafoo.**

**Wow, you guys are amazing. 22 reviews! Seriously! Ooh, and we smashed the 700 review mark. And so, in honour of the occasion, I would like to thank every single person who has reviewed and give special thanks to those who review regularly. Your reviews make my day, it's pathetic how happy I get when I get reviews, it really is. Thank you ever so much!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Percy x Cho  
The Burrow

She hated the Weasleys. Well, perhaps hate was too strong a word, but she didn't have a whole lot of liking for them. They were, she had found, very exclusive. Hypocritical really, seeing as they were so against blood supremacy and all that. It seemed to fit in you had to be red haired, orphaned (although, you still qualified if one parent was dead), underfed or generally miserable.

She didn't think she was any of those things. She had both parents, brown hair, got plenty to eat and wasn't exactly happy as such, but she didn't have a tragic life story.

She didn't fit in with the Weasleys. However, today was the first day of the new Cho. She was going to embrace being a Weasley and all that entailed. She was going to at least become friends with her husband; Percy couldn't be all that bad. He was a good person, he would be a good friend. She knew he worked hard and loved hard – his evident love for his family was proof of that. She knew he was responsible and mature. She didn't know much about him, very little indeed, but she knew that he would be okay.

She wanted to at least like her husband, the father of her children (she hadn't actually had them yet, but he would be the father when the time came). Maybe she could grow to like his family as well. Maybe when she knew them a bit better, they would open ranks and let her in. She kind of wanted to be part of a huge family, she always had.

She was an only child, her cousins were much older than her and had zero to little interest in her and her uncles and aunts were mostly ancient or lived in far flung countries. Her parents were the only family she really had. She loved them, of course she did, and she saw them a lot. They hadn't seen each other during the war, and before that they'd only seen her during the school holidays, and they were making up for all that lost time now. But sometimes she just wished that she had other people, other family, to fall back on, to talk to and laugh with and joke with.

The Weasleys had done that for a few other people, perhaps they could take her in to. She would need to get to know them first though, make some effort.

Suddenly, someone knocked on the door disturbing her inner reverie. Percy. She had been expecting him. She had learned to expect him at least fifteen minutes later than the time he had said he would arrive. His work often ran late. She didn't mind much - admittedly she had been angry at the beginning – now she just saw it as a sign of how hard he worked. Hard working was good.

"Hey." She said, opening the door. He wasn't all that bad looking, she thought critically, discreetly looking him over. He looked tired, she decided. Working too hard no doubt.

"Hi, how have you been?" He followed her inside.

"Good thanks. You alright?" He nodded assent. "Erm...did you want a drink?" She offered.

"Yeah, sure." He said, "Erm, butterbeer?"

She dug out two bottles and used magic to open the lids. She handed one to him and sat down beside him on the sofa.

This was awkward, it always was. Neither wanted to go straight to bed, neither wanted to sit here and talk. But they did it this way anyway. Every time he visited, they would sit on this sofa and drink butterbeers and talk about nothing very much. It was always really inane chatter, stuff to fill the time, to try and dispel some of the awkwardness. Usually it just made it far more awkward than it had been in the first place.

This time was going to be different. She had something she wanted to say to him. She wondered if there should be some sort of build up. Maybe she should just come out and say it. Babbling, she thought, she was putting it off by babbling.

C'mon Cho, you're a grown up, mature adult. You've faced worst. The Battle, that was scarier. Just say it for Merlin's sake.

"Erm..." She began. Percy looked up from his butterbeer, a little startled – she didn't usually volunteer conversation. "I just wanted to say something. It's kind of...important."

He looked surprised. "Oh. Okay then, I'm all ears." He offered her a brief half smile.

"Well, I've been thinking....a lot, about us and this marriage and stuff and...nature is gonna take it's course soon and I'm going to get pregnant. Only, I'm really worried about when I have the baby...about us, I mean, we hardly talk. We don't know each other. What's our child going to think? I know that we were matched together and I know that we had no choice in this, because obviously we would never be each other's first choices. But...I think we should at least know each other, be friends or whatever...I don't want my kids to grow up thinking their parents hate each other. I can't do that to them. Our world has seen enough unhappiness, I want my kids, our kids, to be happy. They deserve the happiness that we never got. I can't have them think we hate each other. Maybe that's not the right word, because I certainly don't hate you and I'd like to think you don't hate me as such, but we obviously have no interest in each other and the other's life. Well, I don't want my kids to grow up splitting their time between two houses and having parents that know nothing about each other and wondering why their parents don't love each other, never loved each other." She finished her monologue and, hands twisting uncomfortably in her lap, ventured a quick glance at him.

Percy opened his mouth to speak and then closed it again, clearly thinking of the right words to say. "I think..." He said slowly. "That you are right. We're not a...conventional couple." Both smirked a little at the understatement. "But, our children deserve better. I think, that for their sakes, we need to make an effort."

"I agree. I...I'm prepared to make an effort to get to know your family. I know they're the biggest part of your life...if that's okay?" She had begun confidently but insecurity had set in half way through. What if he didn't want her involved with his family? Was she intruding? Maybe he didn't want their two worlds to collide like that. Perhaps she shouldn't have been so bold...

Her thoughts were cut off by him talking again. "Thank you." He said sincerely. "I know it's been hard for you, trying to fit in with them. They can be...well, we're close knit. It took me eighteen years to find my place, to realise I needed them and that I did fit in. I think you'll find yours. I'll help you."

She bit her lip and nodded her thanks, a little too overcome to speak. She really wanted to fit in, she realised. It wasn't just for Percy's sake or for her children's sakes. She wanted to be part of this big loving, close knit, tight knit, perfect family unit. She wanted to find her place amongst them. She wanted them to be her family, her in laws perhaps, but family nonetheless.

She wanted to laugh at the irony of it all. She'd spent a long time hating them and wishing she wasn't part of this. And now...now she, Cho Chang, wanted to be a Weasley!

"Thank you." She managed. "Thanks. I think I want to be part of it. Your family...I've always been jealous of big families."

"Don't you have a big family?"

She shook her head. "No, there's just me and my parents."

He looked actually shocked. "But... but, what d'you do?"

She chuckled. "What do you mean?"

"Well...who'd you talk to? Who do you turn to when you need help? Who do you laugh with and joke with? Who'd you tease? Who do you love?"

She nodded appraisingly. "I guess...well, I have my parents...and we're really close, always have been. I'm their only child so they're like the typical parents with only one child – really really overprotective." She grinned. "I guess it's them. I have less people to turn to and fall back on...but there are still people there."

He nodded. "Still. Safety in numbers and all that. I've always liked the reassurance that there will always, always been someone there, no matter what."

She smiled shyly. "That's what I'm jealous of, someday my parents will go and it'll just be me."

He paused for a long moment. "It won't be just you." He said solemnly, not quite meeting her eye and flushing a faint pink. "You'll have me."

There was a long silence which Percy broke, evidently mortified. "I mean...I mean, if you want, that is-"

She cut him off, slipping her hand into his, just for a second or two. "I'd like that."


	70. Seamus and Parvati 4

**A/N: Seamus and Parvati for ****Kris 77, Reader-1996, Whisperheart and annouska.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. Jo Rowling does. **

Seamus x Parvati  
St Mungo's

He squeezed her hand tightly in his as they made their way through the maternity unit. It was one of the largest units in the entire hospital and packed to the brim with newly pregnant women, evidently the product of so many new marriages.

Some looked horrified, scared at what they were carrying. Those were the ones who obviously didn't like their husbands. Some looked happy; these were the women who loved their spouses. All of them looked nervous – they were about to have children, it would be one of the biggest events of their lives. Perhaps, even the biggest.

Parvati belonged firmly in the second camp with a definite hint of number three. She was thrilled to be having a child, his child, but she was terrified. What if she wasn't a good mum?

Her own mother had been a good mum, although a little distant. Parvati had always had Padma though so she hadn't really noticed that her mother wasn't always there.

It wasn't that her mother was a bad mum; she wasn't, not at all. It was more that she had been very young when she had had the twins and had been incredibly beautiful in her youth. She resented her girls for being younger and more beautiful than her, for having chances she never had, for having the life she could have had. It didn't mean she didn't love them, just that her love was tinged with jealousy.

Parvati wanted to be the best mother ever. She knew, just knew, that Seamus would be an amazing father and she had to match up. He was loving and caring and patient and kind, he would be the best dad in the world. The children would adore him, of course they would. She shot him a quick smile, he grinned back.

"Excited?" He leaned down to whisper in her ear.

She nodded. "Yes, we're going to see our child for the first time."

"I like that...our child."

She giggled. "I do too."

He rested his chin against the top of her head. She smiled contentedly, not missing the jealous looks some of the other pregnant women were shooting her. A lot of them were unaccompanied or had come with friends or mothers. Not many husbands had turned up. It proved how amazing Seamus was – he had come along with her. He'd actually insisted on coming. This was the first time they would see their baby, he'd declared (very loudly) that he wouldn't miss it for all the tea in China.

The procedure was actually derived from a Muggle procedure – ultrasound. Healers had worked out that, actually, in this instance the Muggles had gotten it right. This was the best way to see the baby when it was still in the womb.

It was a little different from the Muggle version though. Muggles used a special pad and ran it over the woman's stomach. Wizards had developed a spell which did the same trick without having to use electrical equipment (magic folk never did well with electricity and most electrical items never worked within magical areas – something about magic rendered them useless) and with no need for that nasty cold gel Muggles used.

There was a lengthy queue ahead of them, people lining the corridor. Apparently witches across the country were falling pregnant. She wondered exactly how many other children would be born when her own child was. It felt a little disappointing. She wanted her child to be special. Of course, it would be special. But so would the hundred or so other children born on the same day.

They would be an odd generation, she thought, a generation born from parents forced into marriage. Some would be raised in loving environments, secure in the knowledge that their parents loved each other. Some would be the product of two parents who hated each other or had no interest in the other and only met up when legally required to. This would be a lost generation, a guilty generation.

Her children would be loved. She made a silent promise that she would tell them every day that she loved them and she loved their Daddy and always would. They would know that their parents were in love and that they themselves were loved.

Suddenly, her name was called and as usual she got a little stab of happiness from hearing her married name.

"Mrs Parvati Finnigan!"

Seamus stood up, pulling her along with him.

A Healer with vivid red hair stood at the end of the corridor. She flashed them a very brief smile and ushered them into one of the three little rooms leading off the corridor. Inside was a bed, two chairs and a screen.

"Okay then, Mrs Finnigan. If you just lie down on the bed and pull your top up so we can see your stomach. Mr Finnigan if you'd like to take a seat by the bed." The Healer said in a brisk tone. She clearly didn't have much time allocated to each patient.

Parvati did as instructed and Seamus sat down in one of the chairs, drawing it up right to the bed and taking Parvati's hand.

"Right, you might feel a very light pressure on your stomach, nothing to worry about." The Healer said.

She drew her wand and held it a few centimetres above Parvati's stomach. She muttered a spell under her breath, too low for either of them to catch and pointed distractedly at the screen.

It took a few moments for the picture to flicker for life. Parvati felt a light pressure on her stomach, as described, almost like someone was running a hand across her stomach. The Healer deftly moved her wand and the image changed from black nothing to a grey, misty shape. The couple were transfixed by the picture – their first glimpse at their child.

They could make out features, body parts – the head, the legs, the arms. Their child was perfect. Parvati blinked back a few tears and Seamus kissed her forehead tenderly, still mesmerised by the picture.

The Healer began to talk and something remarkably like a Quick-Quotes Quill flickered to life, the quill flying across the paper and recording the Healer's words.

"Okay...Finnigan baby, healthy, erm... yeah, we have a heartbeat and that is..." She counted for a few moments, mouthing each number. Seamus thought he was going to explode – what was she counting? Was something wrong? Was his baby hurt?

"Yes, that is normal. Normal heartbeat. Looking like an average sort of size, small if anything but not drastically so, no problems there. Four limbs – two arms, two legs. Doesn't look like there are any problems at all."

Seamus grinned and Parvati squeezed his hand tightly. Their baby was well and healthy!

The Healer turned to face the couple. "Okay, firstly would you like a copy of the picture?" She gestured, with her free hand, to the screen.

Both nodded eagerly. Of course they wanted a picture - they needed to be able to show everybody how perfect their child was, they wanted to be able to look at him or her, they would treasure this photo forever.

"Okay, we will sort that out for you. And, would you like to know the baby's gender?" She didn't look that interested. Parvati didn't understand her attitude – this was their baby and it was happy and healthy and beautiful. It was one of the happiest days of her life! She wanted everyone to share in her joy. Seamus certainly was.

"Yes, we would." Parvati told the Healer. Seamus nodded in agreement.

They had already decided that they wanted to know what gender their baby was. Parvati had wanted to know and Seamus had agreed. It would be easier to choose names and buy things and decorate the room if they knew whether it was a boy or a girl.

He was hoping for a little girl. Of course, a boy would be fantastic. But he'd always fancied having a couple of girls. Most men wanted boys. They wanted someone to pass on their male knowledge to, to teach to kick a football and ride a broom, to pass on their genes and their family name. He wasn't that bothered about it. He knew his Mam would like him to have a son so that the Finnigan name wouldn't die out. He didn't mind.

He thought he'd be good with a daughter. Spoil her rotten, of course, and he'd be thoroughly wrapped around her finger by the time she was six months old. And, of course, he would be overly protective from the day she turned twelve and he would, evidently, have to be rude and vaguely threatening toward any boys she brought home. It was practically the law.

Parvati didn't mind either way. She just wanted a baby. A beautiful baby, half her and half Seamus. This baby would say to everyone that they were in love, so in love that they decided to reproduce, to bring another life into this world. She so wanted a baby, no... she wanted his baby. He was the love of her life, her husband and the father of her children. Or he would be, when they were born.

She felt a huge rush of love for him and found herself reaching over to cup his face tenderly in her hands, planting a kiss on his lips. He grinned.

"What was that for?"

"Because I love you." She said simply.

The Healer looked like she was pretending they weren't in the room. She was staring determinedly at the screen and finding out the baby's gender.

"I love you too, Par. Always."

The Healer cleared her throat loudly and Parvati pulled away. The Healer's coughing motion evidently caused her wand to move because the screen changed and the Healer jumped and leaned forward on her chair. She was so close that neither Seamus nor Parvati could see the screen.

"What is it?" Seamus said quickly. What was wrong? Had something happened?

A little frown line appeared between the Healer's eyebrows and then quite suddenly, she relaxed, leaned back and smiled.

"You're having twins. That was why the first baby was a little small, there are two of them. Congratulations." The Healer even managed to crack a smile, it even looked pretty genuine.

Seamus blinked spastically then chuckled once, he leaned in and kissed Parvati full on the lips. Parvati looked like she was going to scream with sheer happiness.

"They're both girls." The Healer said, after a moment's examination of the picture before her.

Seamus smiled widely. This was the best day of his whole life. He thought he couldn't be any happier than he had been on his wedding day. That had been a fantastic day, he had gotten his girl that day. Parvati had married him, taken his name. She'd stood up, in front of everyone, and publicly declared that she loved him, Seamus Finnigan, and he'd been so thrilled. This though probably topped it. They were having twins, twin girls. He would get not just one little girl to love and spoil and cherish but two. He smiled blissfully at his beautiful wife, the woman who was carrying his girls. They were the three girls he loved most in the world. And love them he did.


	71. Lee and Pansy 2

**A/N: Lee and Pansy for Whisperheart, mishafoo and lovenotwarXo. No Pansy in this one because, to be completely honest, I don't really like her!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Lee x Pansy

_He'd never cursed himself before. It was oddly difficult to turn his wand round to himself. His hand was shaking, pathetic really. He took another deep breath, his last on this earth perhaps._

_Goodbye..._

He closed his eyes and whispered two words he never thought he'd say.

"Avada Kevrada."

Nothing. He opened one eye, just to take a peek. Perhaps, something had gone wrong...maybe there was a delay or something on spells like these?

He knew, deep down, exactly what the problem was. Of course he did. He continued to pretend for a few more long minutes though that he didn't know what was wrong and that it was obviously just a mistake.

He tries again; his hand is less shaky this time. Perhaps, he thinks with morbid humour, that you get better at suicide with practice or something.

"Avada Kevrada." He finds himself speaking with irritation now. Why can't he just hurry up and die already? He's tired of this life, this life is bad. He wants a good life, somewhere far away from other people and ridiculous laws and blood supremist tyrants. He doesn't want to marry Pansy Parkinson or have children with her or watch as other people fell in love with their husbands and wives whilst all he had was Parkinson.

This life wasn't kind. It was cruel and harsh. The next life would be better, safer, happier, healthier, fairer. He would be able to marry whomever he liked and he wouldn't have to fight for his life. The next life would be better.

There was just one barrier between him and the next life.

He didn't want to die. Not really.

Dying was the only way. However, it wasn't the way he wanted. It wasn't an option, a choice, it was something he simply had to do.

And that was the very reason that the spell wouldn't work. In order for a spell to have any effect, the caster has to mean it. That was why many of the good side where unable to use the Unforgivables – they didn't want to cause harm and so the spells didn't work, or they were poor, weak imitations which held only for a few moments.

He didn't really want to die and the spell knew that. The spell knew that he wasn't quite ready to leave this life yet and it kept him alive by refusing to work.

It was maddening. He had no other way of dying - just this one little spell, which refused to work for him. Typical.

He put his wand down sulkily, finally admitting defeat. There was no way out of this hopeless situation.

He was going to have to marry Pansy Parkinson. He was going to impregnate her and have children with her – horrible little pug-faced creatures. He would have a weird attraction to her, magically induced of course. His life was going to be horrible, Merlin awful.

He tried desperately to think of something he could do, an escape route, anything. He was desperate, he would do anything, anything at all to stop this from happening.

He had tried suicide and that hadn't worked. He considered the legal options. There was no loophole available but he could wait and go through the appeal process. The problem with this was that he would have to actually marry Parkinson first and then he would be 'attracted' to her and therefore, less inclined to appeal against being married to her in the first place. The Ministry had clearly thought this process through.

That ruled pretty much any of the legal processes out. There was nothing out there to get out of these marriages. Even a personal appeal to the Minister himself would be fruitless.

He wondered about hiding. He had been on the run from the Death Eaters during the war – they didn't take kindly to his illegal broadcasts – and he'd been pretty adept at fighting off any of the morons who did actually manage to catch up with them. He'd done his bit in the battle, took out a few of the enemy. He was a good defensive wizard. He would do okay if he hid. Thing was, he didn't know how long he could stay hidden for. The Ministry had a special unit set up with the sole purpose of tracking down wizards and witches who had run away. They were supposed to be very good at their job. He probably wouldn't last longer than a year, perhaps eighteen months at best. He would have to leave his whole life behind. He wouldn't be able to see or talk to his friends, his parents, his sister. He wouldn't be able to settle in any one place for any length of time. Such was the life of a fugitive, always running, always alert, never letting their guard down for a second. Did he want such a life?

And when they caught him, and of course they would eventually find him, he would be made to marry Pansy.

He groaned and flopped backwards onto his couch. The springs squeaked indignantly in protest. He didn't have a lot of money and had gotten this thing cheap. It was ridiculously uncomfortable and had been a vivid shade of yellow, he had charmed it to be blue instead, however, there was nothing he could do about the dodgy springs or thin-as-a-sheet padding.

He fidgeted for a few seconds in an attempt to get comfortable, giving up when he realised that this was the world's most uncomfortable sofa.

He began to think again, to consider his options. There wasn't a lot left.

Legally, there was nothing he could do. He couldn't quit this life. Running was pointless.

Then it hit him. Resistance groups.

There were two still operating; there had been at least thirty, probably more, when the law was first introduced. The Ministry had closed some down, thrown the ringleaders into Azkaban and others had disbanded, usually because their members had fallen in lust with their spouses.

There were still two out there.

He didn't know much about them really. They fought the law. One of them had been behind a recent huge poster campaign. Thousands of posters, flyers and leaflets had been distributed around various wizarding locations, all denouncing the law, Kingsley and the Ministry in general. They had had some quite amusing slogans as well. It had taken the Ministry two weeks to clean them all up because they multiplied whenever they were touched magically. That group was supposedly the less violent of the two. The other one was supposed to be more confrontational – a little more like Muggle terrorists. The Daily Prophet had run a huge feature on the two groups, comparing and contrasting the two. It had been surprisingly detailed given how secretive the groups were.

A resistance group was pretty much the perfect solution. He wouldn't be forced to marry Parkinson. He could stay hidden but still have people around him, people in exactly the same desperate situation as him. He could fight, fight against this law, because he knew that what he really wanted to do was fight. The Ministry was cruel and unjust, he needed to fight. This was like You-Know-Who's takeover, only because it was the Ministry of Magic being the tyrant, people seemed to think it was acceptable. It wasn't. It was wrong and he, Lee Jordan, was going to join the fight.

There was just one teensy-tiny-weeny problem. He had absolutely no idea how to join one of the groups. He wasn't picky about the one he joined - although he did have a slight preference for the more confrontational one. He wanted to do something physical with his anger – tear down a building or send Dungbombs to the Ministry or something along those lines.

He knew that the groups were based in London in order to be close to the Ministry. Only, how did he make contact with one? How did he find them? How did he join one?

-

And this was how it came to be that one Lee Jordan was wandering around London, in the rain, looking for nothing in particular and wondering what to do. He felt like a fool. He'd taken to wandering the streets of London in the hope that one of the resistance members would see him, realise that he wanted to join and sign him up right there and then. Or something like that anyway.

This was the eighth day of seeing nothing, finding nothing, talking to no one. Maybe his search was entirely fruitless. He had lingered outside the Ministry for several long hours, fielding weird looks and defensive questions, he had ventured down dark, back alleys, he had been to every single wizarding pub in London, asking questions to shady characters who all seemed to know nothing. Did the resistance groups even exist? Where they out there somewhere?

Maybe he should just give up...he could probably throw himself off a cliff or something...

"Stupefy."

He didn't even have time to react before the spell hit him square in the back, rendering him unconscious, his body hitting the ground.

_What happened?_

-

He woke up, disorientated and aching. His hands were securely fastened behind his back with what felt like rope, it bit viciously into his wrists. He was leaning against a cold wall, stone from what he could feel with his numb fingertips. It was dark.

Suddenly, he heard a voice. "You've been looking for us."

"Who are you?" He said, still a little dazed.

"The ones you seek." The voice sounded like it was smirking.

"If you're one of the resistance groups, then yes...I was looking for you." He said eagerly. He'd found them!

"Why?"

"I want to join. I need to join."

"And what makes you think we want you to join?"

Lee paused, thinking of the right words to use. "I'm in a pretty desperate situation and I have no way out. This is my only option. I've never really gone in for law breaking before, apart from during the war but that doesn't really count, but I'm pretty good at resistance. I ran Potterwatch during the war. I can fight, fight pretty well. I was in Dumbledore's Army and taught by Harry. I work hard. And, I want this. I have to fight. Everyone else, most of my friends, are sitting back and letting this...this tyranny be imposed on us. Not me. This law, it's wrong, plain wrong and I don't understand why people can't see that. We have to fight, no one else is. We have to get rid of this. We have to be free."

And just like that, a flash of light shot at him. He winced and tried to recoil, finding then that it was only removing the rope from his hands.

A hand appeared from the darkness, he took it and got to his feet. He stretched his aching limbs and muscles, trying to ignore the nagging twinges and pains.

"You're in kid." The voice said. "You're the exactly the sort of person we need to fight this thing."


	72. Neville and Hannah 4

**A/N: Neville and Hannah for Reader-1996 and x8jessica8x.**

**Not a lot of dialogue or action or Neville, just so you know, but there are a lot of thoughts. I think it's important to show that Neville isn't the only one affected and to see how Hannah is dealing with this.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Neville x Hannah  
St Mungo's

They had been sitting here for what felt like forever. It felt like a silent vigil. They barely moved, apart from to fetch endless cups of coffee and use the bathroom. They didn't even talk that much. What was there to say?

Neville spoke to the Healers, they came twice a day to run a few tests and make sure his Gran was clean and comfortable. She stood by his side whilst he asked questions in a steady voice, she took his hand when the answers weren't the ones he wanted to hear and she held him in her arms when he raged and fumed and cried afterwards, when the Healers had gone.

She didn't know what to do. She was completely out of her depth here. She had never watched someone die before. She never wanted to do so again.

When the Final Battle had come and she was surrounding by fighting and her heart was beating so fast, too fast, she had seen a body hit the floor. She had dashed over to it, fumbling blindly for a pulse and had been oh so relieved when she found one. That had been the closest to death she had ever been.

This was a completely new, frightening, alien experience for her.

She knew this hospital like the back of her own hand – she knew it so well that it scared her sometimes. She knew exactly how to get from this room to the cafeteria, to the toilets, to the exit, to the Floo fireplaces, to Alice and Franks' room, to the Healer's station. She knew the names of five of the eight staff on this ward – three Healers and five Mediwitches. They all knew her as well, greeted her by name and asked how Augusta was (as if they didn't already know – they had her notes with them, of course they knew she wasn't any better). She knew which food she liked at the cafeteria and where the toilets with the showers were. She knew where the best coffee machine was. She knew that the reception was the busiest place and that there were parts of the hospital that no one ever really visited, and she knew which parts those were. She knew the smell, Merlin the smell. That smell...it made her feel sick, she tried to ignore it but it crept up on her, trapping itself in her clothes, her hair, her skin. It never left. It was sickly sweet, a mixture of disinfectant and stale air and stale breath and death.

She knew this hospital well.

And it scared her. She shouldn't know it so well, she shouldn't. Neville knew it even better than she did. He'd been visiting ever since he was a baby.

They'd been here eight days now. She had left the hospital grounds three times – to shower, to ensure that their house was okay and to get clean clothes. Neville hadn't left the hospital once. He went out for walks in the grounds sometimes. Not many people knew that St Mungo's had gardens – they were somehow inside the main building but outside, all at once. Anyone could walk in them, or sit on one of the benches, often visitors took less ill patients out there to sit in the sun.

She had been a few times; she liked to eat outside of the hospital room. Neville went alone, usually to walk and compose himself. He still didn't like to cry in front of her, even though she had told him so many times before that she didn't mind and that she was here no matter what and that she wouldn't think any less of him if he did cry. He just said he knew and then cried by himself in private.

The only time he really cried was when the Healers came in. They pursed their lips and shook their heads and told him that she was slipping away. It was just old age, they said, nothing they could do. They'd tried a few spells and potions but nothing worked. Augusta Longbottom's time had come. Well, it was close anyway, dangerously close.

There was a sense of irony in the fact that Augusta had survived two wizarding wars, fought in both and survived. Now that both were over, she was dying.

Neville was still struggling with that fact. Hannah less so. It sounded callous but she didn't mean it that way. She hadn't been anywhere near as close to Neville's Gran as Neville himself had been, of course she hadn't, in fact she'd always been rather scared of her. She'd grown to like her, although it was more a respecting like than a friendship like, of course she didn't want her to die. She was horrified and upset that Augusta was going to die.

But she was more practical than Neville, or perhaps he just wanted his Gran to live so badly that his judgement was clouded. She had accepted that Augusta was going to die and that it was going to be awful and horrible and upsetting and she had accepted that she would need to quietly deal with her own grief whilst ensuring that Neville was okay and eating and sleeping whilst simultaneously making funeral arrangements, including getting in touch with every single one of the thousands of people Augusta had known. It was going to be a difficult task but she was prepared to take it on.

It was her duty as Neville's wife and Augusta's granddaughter-in-law. She owed it to Neville and Augusta to ensure that everyone kept it together and that things ran smoothly and to be there whenever Neville needed her. He would need her a lot, especially in the first month or two; it was going to be hard for him.

He had been the one closest to Augusta. She had been everything to him – mother, father, grandmother, grandfather, friend, carer, guardian, brother, sister. Everything. Her role had been well above and over that generally expected by a grandmother. She had raised Neville pretty much from birth.

Besides Hannah herself, Augusta was really the only person Neville had left on Earth. He had lost his own parents, never really had them in the first place. He only had his Gran. And her, Hannah, of course.

When his Gran went, he would only have her. His Gran had told her that once, made her promise to take care of him.

The old woman was the most formidable, frightening, ferocious battleaxe she had ever met – but there was no doubt that she cared for Neville, she loved him. It was evident. She rarely, if ever, said it but it was evident, she loved Neville.

Most people did. He was the sort of person you couldn't help but like. She looked fondly over at her husband. He was asleep in his chair, slouched right down. He looked exhausted. He had dark shadows under his eyes and a thick coating of stubble. He needed to look after himself, she thought, or she needed to look after him better. He didn't care about his own health right now so she had to do that for him. She needed to make sure he showered and ate and shaved and slept. It was her duty.

Almost as if he could feel her eyes on him, Neville opened his eyes. He blinked drowsily a few times before his eyes focused and he half smiled at her before he remembered where he was and the smile died, as it always did. "Hey. Any change?" He said in a voice rough from sleep.

"No." Hannah said quietly. "Nothing, the Healers will be here in a minute though. I can hear them doing their rounds."

Neville nodded and sat up straighter in his chair. These hospital chairs, they had discovered, were actually the most uncomfortable chairs in the known universe.

"And afterwards, you need to go home for a little while." Hannah said firmly.

Neville blinked once and then shook his head. "No. I have to be here."

"We've been here eight days and she hasn't woken up, Neville. You haven't had a proper night's sleep since then and you only eat cafeteria food. You look awful." She smiled sympathetically, apologising and trying to soften the blow of her harsh words. "Your Gran made me promise to look after you. And I'm not doing a very good job of it, she'd be disappointed with me and we can't have that."

"When did you promise her that?" He said curiously.

"October...when we....the second time we visited your parents. You left and she asked me to stay because I was going to run out after you, she said she had something to tell me and she made me promise to look after you."

He nodded. "I remember. You were really quiet afterwards."

"Well, I had a lot to think about." Hannah said quietly, her tone changed to a much firmer one. "Now, the Healers will come in and then afterwards you're going to go home and shower and shave and change your clothes and have something decent to eat. I will stay here and if anything changes, I'll Apparate to you immediately."

She wasn't usually a firm sort of person. She didn't usually give orders. She took any promises she made very seriously though. She had promised Augusta that she would look after Neville, she had to keep her promise and the only way to do that was to be strict and firm and insist that he went home for a bit.

To her surprise, he nodded his assent. "Kay, you're right anyway."

"Yes."

He half smiled at her. "C'mere."

She got up and walked round to him. He pulled her onto his lap, she went, blushing.

"The Healers are coming." She reminded him gently.

He nodded and held her closer. "Yeah." Then he kissed her forehead. "Thanks."

She was surprised. "For what?"

"Just being here. Love you."

"You too." She slipped her hand into his and squeezed it tightly.

Things were awful at the moment and they were about to get a lot worse, but they'd be okay. They'd been through a lot and they'd stayed strong. It would be hard, these next few weeks, but they'd get through it. They had each other. She would look after him, as promised. She would comfort him and cry with him and make sure that he always knew she was here for him. She would need to be strong, stronger than she'd ever been before and that scared her a little because she'd never thought of herself as being particularly strong. Neville was the pillar of strength in this relationship. However, he was going to be the weak one, the one that needed comforting and she would need to stay strong for him. She would do it, for him. She'd do anything for him. They would get through this together.


	73. Dean and Lavender 2

**A/N: Dean and Lavender for LovelyRoses and Reader-1996.**

**Okay, just so you know, I am trying to get every single couple with five chapters. This means that there is going to be a lot of focus on a few couples, particularly our newest couples – Lee and Pansy and Dean and Lavender. Please keep requesting, I will eventually get around to writing your requested couple!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Dean x Lavender

She took one last look around her flat. It was tidy and presentable. She smiled with satisfaction and then glanced quickly at her own reflection.

A knock on the door interrupted her preening and she flew to answer it, all the time pondering how entirely uncool and unfeminine it was to appear so eager. It went against all of her rules. Ah well, Dean was her fiancé, it didn't matter that much. Rules were overrated anyway.

"Hey." She smiled at Dean.

"Hello." He grinned right back and her heart, rather pathetically, fluttered just a little.

"Come in." She opened the door wider to allow him in and he followed her into the flat.

He'd been here a couple of times before, when they couldn't be bothered to go out for dinner or lunch or whatever. He was still living with his parents, and assorted siblings, so they didn't tend to go back to his place.

He sat down on the sofa. "How've you been?" He asked customarily.

"Fine, can I get you a drink?"

He nodded. "Sure, what've you got?"

"Depends, d'you want something like tea or something like coke or something stronger?"

He grinned, "Something stronger."

"White wine?" She held a bottle up, he nodded.

"Looks good." He was lying. It was the cheapest bottle of white wine she could find. It probably tasted Merlin awful.

She rummaged noisily in a drawer for a bottle opener. He appeared by her side and took the bottle and opened from her hands.

"Let me." He said quietly.

She just nodded and smiled. He had very strong ideas on gentlemanly behaviour and apparently there were things that men just did for women. Some of them were pretty obvious, things like opening the door, some were a little more old fashioned. More liberal women would say that he was prejudiced and patronising. Lavender thought it was sweet all these little things he did for her without being asked.

He pulled the cork and she provided two glasses. He poured generous measures with unnecessary flourishes. She pulled an unimpressed face and he pouted.

"C'mon...that was impressive!" He whined.

"No, it wasn't. Now shut up and drink."

He raised an eyebrow and smirked cockily. "Why Miss Brown, I think you're trying to get me drunk!"

She grinned, "You got me."

"Well," he leaned down to whisper in her ear. "Not if I get you plastered first, love."

She blushed furiously and he straightened up and took a step backwards, a smirk plastered across his face. She shook herself mentally and pretended to have been unaffected by him.

She didn't know what it was, what this was. She had always thought of him as quite attractive but never really thought anything more than that. They had barely signed the contract saying that they would marry when she was hit with these weird new feelings towards him.

How had she never seen how good looking he was? How deep and husky and downright sexy his voice was? How genuinely amazing he was?

He made her heart flutter pretty much whenever he looked at her, let alone when he smiled at her. Even the most casual touch made her shiver with delight and inwardly squeal.

He was perfect, absolutely perfect. And of course, it didn't hurt that he was unbelievably good looking.

Luckily, his feelings seemed to mirror her own. They bantered and teased and flirted, rarely talking about anything too serious. They were just having fun. It was a little backward because technically they were already engaged but this felt very much like dating for the first time. It was all sweetness and light chat and the occasional kiss. They held hands all the time, like love struck teenagers, and smiles seemed to be permanently splashed across both of their faces.

It was like the first flush of love, only this felt real. More real than anything she had ever felt before. It was a little scary.

She had known him for seven and a half years, give or take. She'd been engaged to him for a month. And yet, her feelings were so strong!

Perhaps, they were too strong. She hadn't told him she loved him or anything like that yet, although she thought she did. He probably didn't feel as strongly as she did. He evidently liked her and fancied her, but it wasn't love, not for him, not yet she didn't think.

She wasn't afraid of getting hurt by him. It was kind of twisted to think this – but Dean couldn't hurt her. He was going to marry her, he had to. He liked her now, when he signed those marriage papers those feelings would increase. He would be hers always. She had no chance of losing him, she wouldn't let him go. They were in this for the long haul. She was sure of it.

"I wanted to ask you something." Dean said, breaking her inner musing.

"Go ahead." She smiled.

"Well, I was wondering if you wanted to meet up with Seamus and Parvati soon. There is a Hogsmeade weekend and I was gonna see them anyway, but you could come along."

She blinked. Was he serious? Parvati hated her; she wouldn't even talk to her. Her one time best friend loathed her. She didn't blame her though. It was all her, Lavender's, fault. She deserved to be hated.

She wanted Parvati back though. She missed their long chats and laughing together about nothing in particular. Parvati was going to have twins – so Dean had told her – and Lavender wanted to be there for her. Only Parvati wouldn't want her to be. She had to win back Parvati's liking and trust and it was going to be difficult.

She was scared of rejection. Merlin, she'd been hurt and rejected so many times now that it shouldn't hurt as much. It did, it always did. It hurt like hell. She was scared Parvati wouldn't want to be her friend, she didn't know if she could deal with Parvati's open hatred.

"I don't know." Lavender wavered. "Parvati probably wouldn't want me there."

Dean cocked an eyebrow. "So?"

"Well...I don't want her to hate me even more than she does already." Lavender felt like a stupid schoolgirl all over again.

"She doesn't hate you." Dean assured her. "Seamus said she didn't. She doesn't like you very much right now but you can change that. You've been best mates as long as Seamus and me have been. That sort of friendship doesn't just disappear, Lav."

"She doesn't hate me?" Lavender tried to hide how pleased she was with this small piece of knowledge, she didn't think she'd managed to pull it off.

"No." Dean batted his eyes at her soppily. "Who could?"

She rolled her eyes at him. "Okay, well....maybe."

"Maybe? C'mon...it'll be fun. It'll be the beginning of us."

"Us?"

Dean flushed faintly, it disappeared quickly. He had explained that he rarely got embarrassed and when he did, it was only in short bursts. "Yeah, me, you, Seamus and Parvati. We're gonna be best friends, like a four. It's perfect – you two were best friends, will be again, and me and Seamus are best friends. We're all married at pretty much the same time. We'll be right close knit, set up a family to rival even the Weasleys." Lavender snorted at this – the Weasleys had a clan going, no one could even touch them in terms of numbers.

"Just think about it." Dean said. "We'll be together, all four of us. Our kids will grow up together; they'll practically have four parents. They'll go to Hogwarts together as best friends. We'll go on holidays together and on days out. We'll be round each other's houses all the time. Like a proper four."

And for a moment, she was thinking about it. Dean was right – it would be perfect. They were close, always had been, even at school.

She could imagine her and Dean's children running around with Parvati and Seamus' twins. She could imagine the four of them waving their children off on the Hogwarts Express. She could see trips to the beach. She could see long chats with Parvati over coffee, accompanied by the sounds of their children playing together happily in the background. She could see nights at the pub, the children being babysat, fuelled by too much alcohol and lots of laughter. She could see it all and it would be perfect.

But it wouldn't happen. Parvati didn't want it.

"Go on." Dean said smugly. "Admit it, it sounds good."

Lavender nodded once. "It sounds good. But it won't work."

"Why not?"

"Because Parvati dislikes me. Because our kids will row and we'll get dragged into it. Because we're all too close. Because we'll start finding things about each other that we hate. Because we'll run out of things to talk about."

Dean snorted. "Firstly, you can win back Parvati's liking. Secondly, we'll make a promise to never get involved with any kids stuff. You can never be too close, look at the Weasleys they're always together and they're so loving it hurts. Of course we won't like each other sometimes but that's part of being friends. And, Seamus and I have been best friends since we met on the train here on the very first day and we hardly talked to anyone else apart from you and Par at school and we've never run out of stuff to say. Come to think of it, I don't remember you and Parvati ever shutting up either, I don't think it'll be a problem for you."

Lavender sighed irritably as Dean came up with the 'perfect' solution to each of her problems.

"Okay." She began again. "It won't work because Parvati's twins will be older than our kids and we'll never be able to do anything because not all of the kids will like it-"

He cut in. "Right, Parvati's twins will be at babysitting age by the time we have our fifth kid-"

"Fifth?!" Her voice shot straight through two octaves.

"Well yeah, we're having six." He seemed entirely unfazed by her screams.

"No." She said flatly, repressing a small shudder at the mere thought of six children. "We are not having six."

"We're making our own Weasley clan." He said like a small child. "Seamus and me agreed. We need lots of children to do that."

"I am not having six children."

"Why?" He wailed.

"Because I'll look like a walking potato sack!"

"You'll always be beautiful to me." He said softly.

She smiled. "Thanks, but stop trying to distract me."

He grinned, "Worked though, didn't it?"

She pointedly ignored his comment. "Anyway, as I was saying. I won't be able to cope with six children and you won't be around much because you'll have to work like all the time so we have enough money to look after them all. That's what everyone forgets about the Weasleys – they were always skint. And also, we would never be able to think of six names we both agree on."

"Rose, Emma, Sapphire, Alex, John and Joe." Dean reeled off quickly.

"What?" She stared at him blankly.

"Six names I like. Just thought of them on the spot, pretty good huh? D'you like them?"

"Erm..." She thought about it. Technically she had no problem with any of the names but she didn't want him to be right, he was always so smug when he proved her wrong. "No."

"Liar." He said cheerfully, winding an arm around her waist. "You love the names, and you will love our six kids just as much as you love me."

"Who says I love you?" She said, glaring at him. Was it that obvious – her feelings toward him? She thought she'd hidden them well.

"Behind those narrowed eyes and fierce glare is the unmistakable gaze of love." He said seriously, smirking at her.

"Idiot."

Stupid, lovely, smug, gorgeous, smirking, loveable idiot.


	74. Fred and Angelina 5

**A/N: Fred and Angelina for Whisperheart and Reader-1996.**

**Hey guys – I have this story planned up until chapter seventy two (which is when I will start writing all of the couples again!) and I was wondering how far you want this to go. I think the story still has a lot of life in it, some couples more than others, but I have been writing this for just over nine months and I think it does need to reach some sort of conclusion. I have a few ideas for the ending which will not be anytime soon – I'm definitely writing up to 100 chapters, probably more – but if any of you have any ideas please let me know!**

**Disclaimer: Harry Potter does not belong to me.**

Fred x Angelina

"I like yellow." Angelina said thoughtfully, scanning the room. They had barely any room in their cupboard of a flat. However, Fred and George had gotten to work creating a nursery space as soon as they knew Angelina was pregnant. They had had to remove a few walls and take some space from other rooms but they did now have a nursery, albeit a tiny and cramped one. However, there would be enough room for a crib and a changing mat and a set of drawers and perhaps a rocking chair.

Fred pulled a face. "Yellow isn't for boys."

"There's a fifty-fifty chance of having a boy." She reminded him.

"Sweetheart, I'm a Weasley. My parents had six boys."

She smirked. "But they also had one girl and my genes are in there as well, betcha it's a girl."

Fred shook his head. "Nu-uh, it's a boy. I can tell."

"Yeah, and how many babies have you had?"

"Well none. But, when Ron was born it just looked different to when Ginny was." He explained.

She cocked an eyebrow. "So you are judging it on how my stomach looks as compared to your mother's pregnancies which occurred when you were about two and then about four?"

"Yeah." He didn't seem to understand her point so she just shook her head and changed the subject.

"I definitely think yellow."

"But it's a boy!" Fred wailed like a small child having a temper tantrum.

"Well," she said calmly, despite the overwhelming urge to scream. "We're having our first scan today so we can ask if it's a boy or a girl and then decide accordingly."

He paused, thought it through and then, quite reluctantly, agreed. "Okay, well if, and only if, it's a girl, you can paint this room yellow. If it's a boy then we'll have something else."

"Like what?"

"Green." Fred said in a decisive tone.

Angelina mimed vomiting.

"What's wrong with green?" He sounded actually hurt. Bless him, she thought fondly.

"It looks like vomit. This room is too little for a dark green, it would be way too dark. And I hate light greens."

Fred sighed melodramatically. "But green is my favourite!"

"Why? I thought you were a red and gold man."

"I am. But red and gold don't exactly suit pale skin and red hair. Green looks better. And it will look better on our kid as well."

"Our kid might not be ginger." _Fingers crossed_, she added silently.

He smirked, "It will be."

"Red hair is a recessive gene."

He looked blank for a few moments as he always did when she referred to something scientific or...intelligent. He simply dismissed her comment and continued. "Not for the Weasleys. Red hair is one of our characteristics and if it doesn't have ginger hair then we're disinheriting it."

Angelina laughed and then realised that Fred wasn't. "Oh ha-ha."

"I'm serious, Ange. What would George say if my child wasn't you know...Weasley-ish? I would never live it down!" He hid his face in his hands.

"Stop being a drama queen." She said – entirely used to this sort of behaviour.

He straightened up and assumed a normal expression again. "Righto, anyway Johnson. That kid you're carrying better be a red head with pale skin, freckles and a talent for pranking."

She giggled, "Yeah, I'll get right on that."

"You should – so a green room then, excellent-"

"Nice try." She cut in. He pouted childishly, as he so often did when she thwarted his plotting. "What about cream?"

"That's pale yellow! You've already gotten your way on yellow for a girl; you can't have yellow for my boy."

"Your boy? Are you carrying it around for nine months? Are you going to have to squeeze it out? Are you going to feed it for the first few months?"

"I might do." He sniffed imperiously.

She swatted at his shoulder. "Face it; it's going to be a girl. She'll have brown hair and my skin, lucky thing. Oh, and she'll probably be like Percy...only, you know, smaller and female and ours."

Fred looked like someone had punched him in the face or something equally as horrible. "No." He managed to say. "No. My child, my son, will not be like that. I forbid it."

She cackled wickedly. "You forbid it?"

He grinned, "Yup. Hear that baby," he addressed her still flat stomach. "You better be a boy and have all of the Weasley traits."

"I'm sure she will." Angelina inserted with a wry grin.

He kissed her forehead. "Sorry love." His hands slid down to her stomach and rested there. "But you're deluding yourself, that in there is a boy. Our son."

"Why d'you want a son so much anyway?" She asked curiously.

"I'm not sure." He admitted. "It's male instinct I guess, you know...I want to pass my genes on and all that. Girls are supposed to be harder as well, to raise, and I don't know if I'm ready to be a really good dad yet. A boy would bounce back, if I wasn't a very good dad for the first few years, a girl might not."

She blinks and then throws her arms around him. "You will be a really good dad."

"You think?" He said, resting his cheek on the top of her head in a contented fashion.

"I know." She said firmly.

She can feel his grin, although she can't see it. It's true. Fred will be a really good dad.

"How'd you know though?" He said quietly into her shoulder.

Fred didn't very often confide his innermost thoughts. She suspected he had been working up to this for a long time and, no doubt, worrying about it even longer than that. Not many people know that Fred Weasley, prankster extraordinaire with the devil may care attitude, actually worries like a nervous schoolgirl. Always has, always will. It's one of those habits which are both irritating and endearing in equal measure.

"I know," she pulled back to face him. "I know because you're funny. You make me laugh more than anyone else in the world. Dad's should be funny. I know because you care about your family, you always have done. I know because you're kind and loving and that's exactly what dads should be like. I know because you're also one of the strongest people I know and our child will undoubtedly feel the same. I know because your patient and don't lose your temper easily. I know because you're incredibly clever even though you pretend you aren't. I know because you've got a good sensible head on you – look at the business, it's a joke shop and you two plan it like a military institution! I know because...because you're the best person I know and I couldn't imagine a better father anywhere." She blushed a little as she spoke but continued regardless.

He pulled her into a tight hug, there were no words to express his feelings, and then tilted her chin up gently to kiss her once, twice, thrice. She smiled into his kiss. Life was pretty perfect right about now.

"C'mon Johns-Weasley," he corrected himself at her frown – he still has difficulty remembering that she isn't Johnson anymore, she's Weasley, she's his Weasley. "Let's go for that scan."

She beamed at him and took his hand. He Apparated right into St. Mungo's. The Maternity unit was well sign posted and about a million witches, some accompanied, some not, were all traipsing there as well. Hundreds of witches are pregnant now. The unit was packed and under staffed with very limited resources.

There were three scan rooms. They joined the queue and prepared to wait. There were a few chairs lined up dolefully outside the rooms but they had to stand, shifting uncomfortably and murmuring to each other occasionally, usually about how bored they were.

They saw Seamus and Parvati. They didn't really know each other that well but they said hello and find out Seamus and Parvati are having twins. They congratulated them and when they walk away, Angelina rounded on Fred.

"Oh Merlin – what if we have twins?"

Fred grinned. "Then you'll get twice as big!"

The phrase if looks could kill ran through his mind at the look she shot him. There was murder in that glare and he knew that he was going to be apologising furiously tonight.

"Weasley!" A Healer yelled.

Angelina stalked towards the Healer and Fred followed her, grinning widely at her stiff posture and folded arms.

"Okay, Mrs Weasley can you just lie down there on this bed? You'll need to pull your shirt up so we can see your stomach. Mr Weasley sit there." The Healer pointed at a chair next to the bed and Fred sat down obediently.

The Healer held her wand over Angelina's stomach and concentrated. Wandless magic had never looked so painful. Fred resisted the urge to laugh.

The screen flickered to life and the Healer managed a weak smile. Fred wondered if he should intervene – this was his baby and his wife and this Healer looked exhausted, was she really the best person for the job?

"There's the baby." The Healer said, jerking her wand a little lower on Angelina's stomach. "Yes..." She paused for a very long minute. Fred could almost hear the seconds ticking down.

She moved closer to the screen suddenly, on her chair, frowning slightly. She bit down on her lip and her face tightened. She continued to stare at the screen and then she moved back, back to Angelina and moved her wand again. She continued to move her wand, slowly and very carefully, the screen moved as she did so. They could see the vague outline of a baby, sometimes as she moved it disappeared from the screen.

Angelina's mind went into overdrive. Something was wrong, something was wrong with her baby. _Oh Merlin, please let the baby be okay, please, please, please. Don't panic Angelina, it'll be fine, fine...oh Merlin, please let this be nothing._

Fred squeezed her hand tightly in his own, too tight, far too tight but she didn't complain, her own nails were digging deep grooves into his palm. She felt the urge to cry and swallowed heavily a few times.

Fred spoke up. "What's wrong?" _Please let it be nothing._

The Healer squeezed her eyes tightly shut, opened them again and turned to face the couple. "Something is not quite right...I can't find a heartbeat. I'm going to get another Healer to check, but...I think that you're going to miscarry. I'm so sorry, please stay here and I'll go and get a second opinion." She stood up and hurried from the room.

And that was about when Angelina's perfect world imploded. Her baby...her beautiful baby was gone. He or she didn't have a heartbeat, would never make it out into the world. Her baby was gone.


	75. Lee and Pansy 3

**A/N: Lee and Pansy for sonea91, ChocoxChipxMint and Reader-1996.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Lee x Pansy

"Lee Jordan, hey? I think I've heard of you before..." The man trailed off thoughtfully. "Remind me."

"I ran Potterwatch, the resistance radio during the war." Lee offered.

"Ah yes." The man said slowly. "I remember. It was a good station, perhaps we could get something like that going for this effort."

Lee nodded happily. "That would be good, give some support to all those people struggling. Like I was."

The man, Lee didn't know his name, was the leader of the group. He had a broad Northern accent but apparently he could take on any accent he fancied. He was an enigma. No one knew anything about him or what he really looked like – he was an expert at human Transfiguration and was an avid drinker of Polyjuice Potion. He had appeared almost out of nowhere gathering followers as he went, all hell bent on eradicating the Marriage Law. He had never been captured by the Ministry, in fact they had nothing on him, nothing at all. He was a mystery. Lee had been taken to see this man after he was finally freed by the first man, who was called 'Jeff'.

Jeff, which was definitely not his real name, had taken him through the secret headquarters (Lee still had no idea where they were - perhaps underground somewhere?) which consisted mostly of lots of tiny, twisting passageways until they emerged in a room. It was empty apart from a chair and the man sitting in it. Jeff had acted deferentially towards him, leading Lee to deduce that he must be higher up in the organisation.

In fact, he was the leader. Apparently he insisted on meeting all new recruits personally. Lee couldn't say he liked this man – he didn't, not really. He respected him, he was grateful to him for giving him something to fight for and somewhere to live but there was no liking there. No one likes their boss though.

"Yes, I assume you know how to run a radio station, set it up and whatever?"

"Yeah, it's pretty easy. You have to find a safe house to transmit from though." Lee explained.

"We'll find somewhere." The man promised. "Will it work if you were transmitting from...abroad?"

"Yeah, it'll probably take two wizards to work it though. My magic wouldn't be strong enough on it's own." The signal needed to be a strong one, it was much more difficult to broadcast from long distances. He would need extra magic in order to make it work and to make the signal strong enough.

The man thought for a brief second then motioned to Jeff with a slight beckon of his fingers. "I need you to find a safe house, preferably in France because it's not too far away and it's safe. Then I need another new recruit, one with good knowledge of defensive spells, one just out of training perhaps. We can't really afford to lose anyone on the ground. I need that ready for when this one," he gestured at Lee, "gets out of training. So, that should take two weeks perhaps two and a half at a push. We're going to start a radio station."

Jeff nodded once.

"And," the man continued, "we'll need to raise awareness. Start a campaign, word of mouth, maybe a few leaflets. Let our sisters know."

"Sisters?" Lee asked curiously, despite himself.

The man shot him a brief vaguely irritated glance, clearly he didn't like being interrupted. "Yes, the other resistance group. We did call them brothers but their...methods are a little more...sisterly." His mouth twisted up into a smile.

Lee smirked.

"Anyway, let them know, maybe they'll run a leaflet campaign or something. Password it – first password will be..." He looked enquiringly at Lee.

"Call to arms." Lee said decisively.

"I like it. Use it." The man instructed. "Now, get Lee into training. I reckon he might be able to bypass stage one but stick him in there for a day or two anyway, no need for the whole shebang."

Lee understood precisely none of this but Jeff nodded once more.

"Come on." He said to Lee.

"Good bye Lee, I look forward to hearing your broadcasts." The man said, getting up and turning away from him. He nodded once at the pair and then Disapparated with a small 'pop'.

"Right, we've got lots to do so I'm going to drop you off in training. You'll need to be in stage one for two days and then we'll move you on." Jeff said in a brisk tone. "Follow me, keep up I hate it when people get lost."

With that, he turned on his heel and exited the room at a smart trot. Lee followed, at first he had been confused about how anyone could get lost following someone else. He understood now - Jegg waited for no one, he moved very fast and didn't even pause. The walk was long and went through more corridors, twists and turns. This place was like a maze, Lee thought. It would take him forever to be able to navigate the place as quickly and easily as Jeff could. That, of course, was if he actually had to stay here. Maybe this was just one of the bases.

Jeff suddenly stopped at a dead end. He drew his wand and concentrated for a brief second – clearly doing wandless magic that Lee obviously wasn't allowed to know – and the wall slid open seamlessly to reveal a long corridor, studded with doors.

"Down there, room two. Say Jeff sent you for two days instruction." Jeff rattled off quickly. "I have to go now, good luck, I'm sure I'll see you around sometime." He turned and walked away.

Lee took a deep breath and stepped into the corridor, the wall slid closed behind him. Great – now he was trapped. The doors were numbered, the second one on the left had a huge two painted on it. Cautiously, wand drawn just in case, he knocked on the door.

It opened and a tiny man, probably in his mid-thirties stood at the door. "Yes?" He asked, wand pointed at Lee's jugular.

"Erm...I'm to say that Jeff sent me for two days instruction." Lee said quickly.

The man lowered his wand and stuck his hand out for Lee to shake. "Right, nice to meet you. I haven't had a student in a few weeks now, not many people have joined up recently. Come in, come in. I'm Sam."

"Really?" Lee asked sceptically.

Sam smiled with amusement. "Of course that's not my real name, however, within the organisation only Jeff and the leader know our real names. It prevents any infiltrators from learning any of our members real names."

"Sounds like a good idea. Do I have to choose my own pretend name or does that get picked for me?" Lee enquired.

Sam smirked, "You can choose your own. So, what's your name?"

"I'm...Richard." Lee said, randomly picking a name.

Sam nodded. "Goodo. Right, let's get started then." He turned and allowed Lee to pass into the room.

It was large and somehow had windows, even though Lee strongly suspected they were actually underground. It was set up a little like a school classroom with a blackboard and a front desk. However, where usually there were rows of desks there was just one.

"Sit, sit." Sam said, waving his hand at the desk.

Lee took a seat, feeling like a school kid again as he did so.

"Now, this organisation has devised a training programme. It has four stages, this is the first. I will be your instructor for the two days you're in this stage. This one is all pretty easy, it's all to do with the basics – a bit of very basic defensive work, a lot of information about the organisation and how it works and some information on our methods. You know, the basic stuff really. You're expected to remember all I tell you, you'll be regularly tested on this information and knowledge."

Lee nodded. He had a feeling that this was going to be difficult. Sure, he was pretty good at wand work but all this other stuff, history and tactics...well, it wasn't exactly his cup of tea and he was going to have to work hard to remember it all.

Sam continued his instruction methodically and carefully. He told Lee about the organisation and why it had been founded. Lee knew all that, of course, but it didn't hurt to have it affirmed. He went over the organisation's aims – to eradicate the law and allow all married couples to divorce, if they wished. Lee hadn't thought much about the second part of their aims, truth told he hadn't given much thought to the unhappily married couples. He wasn't married, he had been unhappy but he had avoided matrimony. It must be one hundred times worse for those who were actually married to their hated spouses.

"The organisation was set up within two days of the Law being introduced, before many of us even received our letters telling us who our new fiancés were. It was a struggle at first. We had to organise ourselves, appoint leaders, work out a hierarchy, organise and then take action as well as finding premises and keeping hidden from the Ministry. Luckily, the Ministry were doing some organisation of their own so we had a little time to get ourselves up and running before they really cracked down. If we had to form the organisation now, we wouldn't be able to. The Ministry are stronger now, more prepared. They know how to fight us now, they have people within the organisation." Lee was shocked at this – the Ministry had people in place? Merlin, this was bad.

"Luckily, we also have some idea of who these people are." Sam's next sentence allayed Lee's fears somewhat. "We weed them out by feeding false information to every single member at some point – not during training so you're alright for now – and if it gets leaked, or when we do show up, hidden of course, if there are people there...we know that person has spilled. We don't let them know that we know who they are, we just remember their names and sometimes they just disappear. We have an estimated twenty Ministry infiltrators currently within the organisation. I can't let you know exactly how many members we actually have because I'm not even privy to that information myself. Only one person knows the names and faces of every single member, our leader. He alone knows us all, who we are and what we look like and how many of us there are. No one else is given this information. He is also the only person who knows what each person is doing. He is involved in the organisation of any action taken."

Lee felt like some of this information was a warning in disguise. The message was simple: if you're an infiltrator, we'll find out who you are and you won't last long.

"The most pressing problem currently facing us is numbers. We get a lot of deserters, usually those who are tired of the lifestyle. Being part of this is no walk in the park, Richard. We're constantly on the run, we commit criminal activity, if we are caught we face Azkaban for sure. We don't always get enough to eat and we have to hide in some pretty bad places, if a mission goes wrong. You have to always be on your guard and you'll always wonder if this is the second that twelve armed Aurors spring from nowhere and shoot a few Stunners into you." Lee winced faintly, he had been Stunned before and it wasn't exactly something to be taken lightly.

"This life is hard and harsh but...it's rewarding. We're fighting, fighting tyranny and injustice and sheer stupidity. One day, perhaps tomorrow, perhaps in a few years, we will succeed. I know we will, belief is one of the most important things. You have to keep believing, when you stop believing, the spark dies and you give up, give up the fight. Fighting is what keeps us going, what keeps me going."

Sam had this look in his eyes, all passion and rage and fury. He was driven, that much was obvious, and he believed absolutely in the case.

Lee hoped that one day he would be able to emulate that look, that drive, that determination to succeed. Sam was a believer and Lee needed to believe as well. He had to believe that this Law was going to be abolished, that he would be free one day, that one day he could stop running and hiding and fighting, but until that day...he'd fight with all he had left in him.


	76. Blaise and Hermione 9

**A/N: Okay, so I had intended to get five chapters of each couple but I'm getting bored of writing the same couples over and over and I have a huge pile of requests for other characters so...I am writing all couples again!**

**A very, very requested Hermione and Blaise chapter for: LinetteCullen, Reader-1996, Rosiline, gWeasley77, , Bergere, Afrenchgirl, sonea91, SakuraHarunoGurl, Rainy Summer, jorg0382, x8jessica8x, ChuddleyCanons, Danooli, ChocoxChipxMint, wishing on a shooting star and Crazy-Obsessed-Writer52.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Blaise x Hermione  
St Mungo's

Her heart was beating fast, too fast. She wanted to go back. Her feet trudged dutifully forward carrying her to her destination. The linoleum beneath her feet was a particularly sickly shade of green, flecked with white. It passed beneath her footsteps, each step taking her further and further away from the exit and closer and closer to the place.

The maternity unit.

It was signposted. It had to be. Everyone was pregnant. They all needed this place. It was heaving there, it seemed that every witch in the known universe had shown up. She joined the back of the seemingly never ending queue and leaned against the wall. It felt cool against her fingertips. She closed her eyes for a second and focused on breathing in and out.

There were so many women here. Some were accompanied by husbands. They were happy and blissful, stealing kisses and exchanging loving smiles. Some had brought along mothers or sisters. They plastered fake smiles across unhappy faces and talked about anything but babies to try and distract themselves. Some, like her, were alone. They looked...broken, alone, silent.

She was one of them. One of the unhappy ones.

The unhappy ones were a dwindling minority. A lot of people were happy these days. She wasn't. She felt almost guilty for being unhappy. Her friends were all so happy. Harry and Ginny. Ron and Padma. Hell the entire extended Weasley family was happily married – George and Luna, Bill and Fleur, Hannah and Neville.

She was the lone unhappy person in this sea of happy, in love couples. She was jealous of all those happy couples. So jealous. They were in love; they were going to have long happy lives together. She felt guilty for being jealous of them, for wanting to cry when she saw Ron and Padma steal a kiss when they thought no one was watching, for wanting to scream when she saw Harry and Ginny send one another longing looks over breakfast. She wanted so badly to stand amongst them.

She felt bad for worrying them as well. They were all so worried about her. They worried that she wasn't eating enough, that she was unhappy, that she didn't look like her anymore. She didn't want them to worry, they deserved to be happy, and yet...she just couldn't bring herself to reassure them. Their worry was the only attention she got these days. She knew that someday, someday soon probably, their own lives would distract them and she, Hermione, would slowly but surely be forgotten. They would all move on and be best friends, have babies, raise kids together. Her presence was a draining one, she knew that, it was like she sucked the happiness away from them. They wouldn't want to be with her anymore, wouldn't want to expose their innocent children to her misery. They would slowly, very slowly, stop calling, stop showing up, stop talking to her until eventually she would be forgotten. She would be alone. Alone.

She blinked back tears furiously. She'd done enough crying. She was a strong, independent woman. Strong. Independent. Woman.

_C'mon Hermione, you can do this._

This was not the only reason she was shaking and trembling though. She was a brave person – she'd done her bit during the war, perhaps more than her bit. She wouldn't let a bit of misery make her this terrified.

She hadn't wanted to come to this scan. She was only here because Molly has insisted she ensure the baby was at least healthy.

What if, when she saw the baby, she started seeing it as hers?

She couldn't do that. The only way to stay sane, to keep calm, to hold onto herself was to pretend that this baby was not hers. It was his – Zabini's. It was a Zabini baby and she was Hermione Granger. She was merely carrying the baby; it had no link to her, no tie. She didn't care about it; she would have it and hand it over. She couldn't let herself care. She couldn't.

She had to distance herself from it, from his baby. When it was born, it would look like him and she was counting on that fact to stop herself from loving it. Then she could hand it over to Mrs Zabini almost immediately who would proceed to poison it with Pureblood mania and a love of money and then she would be free to dislike it because the child would stand for everything she hated. The child would despise her with her 'dirty' blood and undoubtedly one day it would call her a Mudblood and refuse to ever see her again and she could stop going to the Zabini mansion.

She would be hurt at this, of course she would. It was always hurt, all of it. But it was necessary.

She could pretend that the child wasn't hers and that she didn't even have children (for she knew she would have to have at least two more) and that way she could keep sane and normal and have half a chance at a normal (ish) life.

There were rumours that the Ministry were considering a new sub section of the law. Something about when three children were produced, the contracts would be lessened, the attraction charms weakened, the couples that didn't want to would not have to meet up as often.

Three children, that was all she had to do, have three children and then she could be free. Well, nearly free anyway. She would throw herself into her work. Mrs Zabini had finally cracked over the whole working thing. Blaise was going to buy her a house, wherever she wanted apparently, and she could get a job as long as she didn't ask for anything from the Zabinis.

That was easy. She didn't want anything from them. She would take the house but the second, the very second, she had enough money she would buy her own house and give his one back. She didn't need anything from him, she didn't want anything of his. She would give him children, little Pureblood brats to carry on the name (although, she still got a twisted sense of satisfaction out of the fact that they would only be half-blood because of her own parentage) and lineage. She would be free of them eventually.

She was planning on destroying the law from the inside. She would work her way, quite innocently, up the Ministry until she had enough authority to get something done about that law. There were others who must feel the same as her, they would listen. She would abolish that law.

"Mrs Zabini!" A Healer yelled. She looked exhausted.

"Here." Hermione said quietly, moving forward. "And please, call me Hermione. I'm no Zabini."

"Right." The Healer said, not really listening. She had clearly had a long day with a lot of work to do.

Hermione lay on the bed as asked to do and lifted her top up a few inches. The Healer held her wand over her exposed stomach and whispered a spell that Hermione didn't quite hear. The screen, directly in front of Hermione, flickered to life.

"Erm...I'm not that bothered about seeing it. Just make sure it's healthy and tell me the gender. I don't want pictures." Hermione said quickly, closing her eyes.

"Are you sure?" The Healer sounded profoundly shocked. Clearly Hermione was not the conventional mother to be. "You know we only do three scans. This is the first; most people like to have a picture at least."

"I don't." Hermione said with her eyes still closed. "Just tell me...tell me, it's healthy."

The Healer turned back to the screen and Hermione tuned out her quiet murmurs. She only wanted to know two things about this baby – that it was healthy and whether it was a boy or a girl. She would be able to tell Blaise – tomorrow when they had to meet – that his son or daughter was healthy.

She kept her eyes firmly closed even though a tiny part of her really wanted to open them. She couldn't. One glimpse of the screen and she knew she would crumble. She was strong, but not this strong. She had to keep strong. _Just don't peek, Hermione._

"The baby is healthy." The Healer said. "D'you want to see?"

"No."

"I don't understand." The Healer said unexpectedly. "It's your baby. Sure it's half him, I'm assuming you don't like this Zabini character but still...it's yours. It deserves better than a mother who hates it."

Her eyes flew open with surprise and anger. She spoke directly to the Healer being very careful not to look at the screen. "It's nothing to do with you. Nothing at all! You don't know anything about me so don't you dare judge me. Just tell me what the damn baby is and leave me alone. It's not mine. It's his."

She closed her eyes tightly.

The Healer sighed and paused for a moment. "It's a boy, Mrs Zabini."

Hermione felt a surge of pure hatred for the Healer. It surprised her. She wasn't usually a violent person but she wanted to punch this stupid woman who knew nothing but hated her anyway right in her stupid face.

"Good." She said tonelessly.

A boy. She was having a boy. No! She wasn't.

He, Zabini, was having a boy. And the boy would be a Zabini clone. It wasn't hers. It was half her but it wasn't hers. She had no claim over this boy, she just carried him. That was it.

He was his.

"Mrs Zabini, are you sure you wouldn't like a picture?" The Healer asked in a sugar sweet voice.

"No thank you." Hermione said very firmly.

"Okay, then we are done. You can leave now." The Healer said.

Hermione pulled her top down and opened her eyes, coming face to face with the screen with the baby on it. Merlin. The Healer was smiling maliciously in her corner. The stupid woman had tricked her.

"Get rid of it." Hermione snapped. She sat up and averted her eyes.

It was too late though, of course it was. She had seen the baby.

And he wasn't his.

This baby was just that...a baby. This baby didn't care about blood supremacy or who her parents had been. This baby knew nothing of money or power or status. This baby couldn't help who it's father and paternal grandmother was.

This baby was innocent and defenceless. If she gave it up to Blaise and his awful mother then it would become the child she had feared – Pureblood manic, money rich and arrogant to boot.

But this baby wasn't that child yet. If she kept the child, she could teach it right from wrong, teach him that money wasn't everything and that blood didn't matter, you could do good without being a Pureblood.

She could keep him. And, for a moment, she let herself imagine.

_Her baby smiling up at her – a lot like her but with a hint of Blaise (it was undeniable that he was good looking, she loathed him but she wasn't stupid, the baby would be alright if it looked like him). Her baby, now a toddler learning to walk, to talk, saying 'Mummy' for the first time. Going to see her parents, his grandparents whom he loved despite the fact that they were Muggles. Waving him off to Hogwarts safe in the knowledge that her little boy was a good person._

Could she keep her baby? Could she defy her husband and his mother and raise her child to be a good person? Was she strong enough to defy them and raise a baby by herself?

She wasn't sure. Not yet.


	77. Dean and Lavender 3

**A/N: Dean and Lavender for Reader-1996 and lovenotwarXo.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Dean x Lavender

"It's gonna be okay." A voice said unexpectedly from somewhere behind her. She jumped about a foot in the air before realising who the voice belonged to.

"Dean!" She cried whirling round to hug him.

"Hello to you to." He grinned. "And like I said, it'll be fine. You shouldn't worry so much."

She wrinkled hser nose. "It won't be fine. She doesn't like me.

"She'll like you again. You're different now, babe. You're a better person, maybe even better than the school Lavender."

"Really?"

"Yes." He promised quietly. "And if it's really really terrible, then I'll make an excuse and we'll leave. 'Kay?"

"Okay. You always know how to make me feel better." She smiled and kissed his cheek.

"What can I say...I'm a man of many talents." Dean smirked. Lavender rolled her eyes, not quite able to hide her grin for very long.

He noticed. Of course he did. He knew her so well. He knew what she felt for him, hopefully he felt it to. Things were perfect between them.

If she could freeze time, right here right now, and never move forward, never have anything change...she would. Her and Dean were perfect, they were to be married soon. She prayed that that wouldn't change anything; she loved how they were right now. She'd always prioritised marriage but with him, with Dean, she found she didn't care. They didn't need to be married to be in love. Of course she wanted to be married, wanted to be his officially, wanted everyone to know they were in love, but it didn't really matter in the grand scheme of things. Marriage would be lovely but they were official already, they didn't need a big ceremony and a piece of paper to prove they loved one another.

"Are you ready yet?" He asked her with a responding roll of his eyes.

"Nearly." She sung. "Go wait in the other room."

"Why?" He pouted adorably. "Can't I stay and talk?"

"No, you won't talk...you'll distract me."

"I won't." He insisted.

She took his hand and pushed him out the door, "Your very presence distracts me."

He grinned just as the door closed, quite firmly, in his face.

It took her ten minutes to finish getting ready and another three to talk herself into opening the door.

Today, her and Dean were going to meet up with Seamus and Parvati in Hogsmeade. The problem? Parvati, her former best friend now happily married and expecting twins, hated her. It was going to be a pretty interesting lunch.

"Come on then." She said reluctantly. Dean looked up from where he was sitting on her sofa.

"You look nice."

She blushed, inwardly cursing her lack of cool-ness. It was just a compliment for Merlin's sakes, no need to go all blushing schoolgirl on him. "Thanks."

He held a hand out to her, she took it and he Apparated to the centre of Hogsmeade village.

"I said we would meet them about here. They shouldn't be long – look." He pointed to the castle, a little line of black clad figures were making their way towards them.

"Can you see them?" Lavender asked.

Dean shook his head. "Naa – I can see Padma though, she's with Ron. You can see his hair. Ooh, and there's Harry and Ginny, you can see her hair as well."

She smiled. He squeezed her hand gently and then leaned down to kiss her forehead tenderly.

"Dean!" A voice yelled. Dean turned to see Seamus, beaming from ear to ear, and holding hands with Parvati.

"Seamus, mate. How are ya?" Dean and Seamus knocked fists.

"Good, good. You?"

"Not too bad. Hey there Par, you alright love?"

"Less of the love, that's my wife right there." Seamus interrupted.

Parvati tutted and shoved Seamus' shoulder lightly. "I'm good taa."

"Hey Lav." Seamus said, grinning at her.

Lavender smiled tentatively back. "Hey. Hello Parvati."

"Hello." Parvati replied, not quite meeting her eyes.

"So, Three Broomsticks?" Dean asked. "I really can't do Madam Puddifoot's today, sorry ladies."

"No problem. Three Broomsticks does better food anyway." Parvati interjected. "Never been a Puddifoot's kinda girl anyway." Lies – Parvati had always always wanted a boy to take her on a date there since she was about twelve years old. Lavender resisted the temptation to say anything, it seemed Parvati wanted to be a different person now.

"That's my girl." Seamus grinned proudly.

They went into the Three Broomsticks and found a secluded table in the corner.

Dean rubbed his hands together. "Right, butterbeers all round?"

"Sounds good." Seamus said. "Sandwiches as well?"

"Yes. Lots." Parvati grinned. "I'm eating for three here!"

Seamus smiled lovingly at her and then at her slightly rounded stomach.

"Congrats love." Dean said. "Two little ones...and Seamus to look after, good luck!"

They all laughed and Dean and Seamus walked off to the bar, play fighting and tussling the whole way there. Lavender smiled fondly at their backs. They were like kids sometimes. Then she realised that her and Parvati were sitting alone at the table. Parvati seemed perfectly content to sit in silence. She hadn't even looked at her once.

"Congratulations." Lavender decided to break the silence.

"Thanks." Parvati said looking straight ahead.

"I can't believe you're having twins."

"Me neither."

Lavender bit her lip. Parvati evidently didn't want to make any kind of effort.

The boys came back then and Lavender was so relieved. They talked mostly to each other but seamlessly drew her and Parvati into the conversation. They teased each other constantly. She watched Dean and Parvati banter back and forth as well, she liked their easy friendship, it was something she hoped to emulate between herself and Seamus. Dean teased her as well, shooting her easy grins to soften the comment. She smirked back and teased him as well. She didn't say anything to Parvati though.

The food came and they tucked in. She didn't eat much. This whole thing had been a failure. Sure she was with Dean and Seamus was talking to her easily enough but...Parvati hadn't spoken to her, hadn't even looked at her.

She just wanted her friend back.

"Right, I have to go to the toilet because one of your-" Parvati shot an accusing look at Seamus who merely looked very proud. "Girls is sitting on my bladder."

"Jeez Par, did you want to be any more detailed?" Dean smirked.

Parvati sent him a death glare. He just smiled. She seemed to give in and definite amusement played around her lips. She disappeared into the crowd.

"I have to go as well." Lavender said. This was her chance.

"Women." Seamus exclaimed. "Why do you go to the toilet together? It's just weird."

"Tell me about it." Dean agreed. Lavender rolled her eyes and left them, they were moaning about women's 'weird' habits like a pair of...old women.

This was her big chance. It would just be her and Parvati. She wanted Parvati back. She wanted her best friend back. She knew she had messed up and ruined their friendship but she was different now. She was prepared to earn back Parvati's friendship, she knew it would be a gradual thing but she also knew Parvati didn't have another best friend. She had no one to turn to apart from her sister or Seamus and sometimes, sometimes that wouldn't be enough. She, Lavender, would be there in those times.

The toilets were empty, apart from Parvati who was standing by the mirror. When Lavender walked in, she stared determinedly at her own reflection, presumably so as not to make eye contact with her.

"Hey." Lavender said quietly.

"What d'you want?" Parvati said rather rudely.

"To get my friend back."

"It's too late."

"No, it isn't. I was stupid and wrong...so stupid. I messed up, okay? I really really really messed up. But...I've been given a second chance, I've got Dean and he's...he's a much better person than I'll ever be and I have to be better, try and be better for him. Because he deserves someone so much better than me and I know that, okay? And I'm trying. But, I want you back as well Parvati. We were best friends."

"Were." Parvati said coldly. "You changed, Lavender."

"I know." Lavender said quietly. "I was awful. But I'm different now, better than I was then. I've still got a long way to go before I'm a good person again but I'm getting there."

"You hurt me." For a split second, Parvati met Lavender's eyes before she looked away again, very quickly.

"I know. I hurt everyone and I'm so so sorry."

Parvati turned around to face her, eyes blazing. "Sorry isn't enough! I needed you. I got married, married Lavender! I needed you to be there for me and you weren't. I'm pregnant, with twins! I'm scared, terrified and so is Seamus and I'm scared things will be different when we're busy running around after the girls and we haven't got time to even talk to each other let alone be together properly! I needed you and you weren't there."

Parvati's words cut deep, real deep. But they also lifted Lavender's spirits slightly. Parvati was screaming at her, clearly angry. If she didn't care anymore, she wouldn't be angry. Emotion was better than nothing. Emotions, even negative ones, proved that Parvati still cared, deep down.

"I know that you needed me and I know I wasn't there. But I'm here now. I know you don't want me, or at least you're telling yourself you don't want to be friends anymore, but I'm not giving up. Seven and a half years is a long time. A friendship doesn't just go away, Parvati. I'll fight for it, I'm not going away. I told you I wanted my friend back and I'm serious, I want us to be how we were. Only better. Because we're different now, older, better, nicer...we could be best friends again Par. Just think about it...Dean and Seamus are desperate for us all to be best friends and we could do that. Best friends, all four of us, raising our kids together, spending time together. We could do that."

"We could." Parvati said slowly, her voice still icy. "But I don't want to do that, Lavender."

Lavender smiled. "You're lying. You never could lie to me."

It was as if something within Parvati snapped. The icy demeanour broke and she yelled furiously at her. "Don't you get it? I don't want to hate you, I never did but I have to. You really hurt me, you hurt all your friends. You can't just apologise and expect to get me back just like that. Sure I want us to be friends again someday, maybe as a four. Yeah I've talked about it with Seamus and Dean and we've all agreed it would be great but right now I can't forget. I can't forgive you because I'm still mad about it. I want you back too, Lavender, just not now. I've got my own life now. I've got Seamus, I'm having twins, I'm working, I'm close with Padma. I don't know where your place is yet."

Lavender nodded slowly. "I know exactly where my place is. So, you've got a husband and you're going to have kids and you've got friends and you've got your sister. But what about a best friend, Par? No one's filled that void because it's my role."

"You were an idiot."

"Yes." Lavender agreed.

"You really hurt me."

"I know and I am sorry."

"But I have missed you. You know, a little bit, sometimes." Parvati said. She was actually addressing the space just above Lavender's left shoulder.

"I've missed you too. A lot." Lavender said honestly. "It's not the same without you."

Neither was ever quite sure how it had happened. One minute they were avoiding each other's gaze and the next their eyes met and then they were hugging and laughing and crying.

"Best friends?" Lavender said quietly.

Parvati hugged her tighter. "Of course."

"Maid of honour?"

Parvati grinned. "Matron of honour, sweetie. I'm a married woman now."


	78. Draco and Katie 8

**A/N: Draco and Katie for LinetteCullen, juniperwing, thedevilandgod, Rosiline, SakuraHarunoGurl, Bergere, Reader-1996, mishafoo, Danooli and and HollyIShort.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Draco x Katie

_She stretched out luxuriantly and felt something warm beside her, something human. Merlin. She opened one eye and then closed it very quickly. She hadn't. Please, please, please Merlin, tell her she hadn't._

_"Morning love."_

_She had._

She swore under her breath. She hadn't actually opened her eyes yet but she could practically feel his smirk.

She realised suddenly that she wasn't wearing any clothes. Quickly, she pulled the sheets up to her neck.

"I've seen it all before, darling, nothing to be embarrassed about." He certainly wasn't embarrassed. In fact, he was grinning like the cat that got the cream.

"Leave."

"This is my room." He pointed out in a reasonable tone.

"Well I can't get up. I can't even see my dress." She looked around for it, still clutching the covers very close to her. His room was scrupulously clean and there was no sign of her dress or, indeed, of any items of clothing.

"I expect the house elves took it. They tidy up. They'll probably wash it and return it to you tomorrow or later." He explained, stretching luxuriantly and folding his arms beneath his head.

"Well what should I wear then?" She demanded frantically. She could feel herself going red with embarrassment. And her head was killing her – how much had she drunk last night?

Oh sweet Merlin, if only she hadn't gotten drunk. The night had been so awful, she'd felt so out of place and so very bored that drinking had been the only viable option. She'd lost count after her fourth glass of Muggle champagne. She could vaguely remember being rude to several people, she actually wasn't the slightest bit sorry about that part. But if she had just put up with it, without resorting to drink, this would never ever have happened.

He smirked devilishly at her. "Nothing?"

She glared at him.

"Look, Kate darling, you are my wife and the only woman I am able to sleep with. I've seen it all before, it's not a big deal. Just get up. I don't mind." He said airily.

She glared. "I don't care what has happened; I don't want you seeing anything. You have to go first."

"Well, I would but I haven't got any clothes either. You were in quite a hurry to remove those." He winked lecherously at her.

She pulled the covers over her head and prayed fervently that this was all just a nasty dream and when she woke up for real she could laugh about it. It didn't happen, she was still here and it had happened and she couldn't laugh about it.

Of course she had slept with Draco before. The charms made it impossible not to. It was actually the law as well and she wasn't a criminal. It had been different this time though.

Different in that she was still in his bed. She always left as soon as she could.

Different in that she had wanted it. She had never instigated it.

Different in that he'd seen her. She always ensured the lights were off.

She was so embarrassed it seemed to hurt. She closed her eyes but it didn't help. She could still feel his presence beside her and she could see images from last night, as if they were painted on her eyelids, her memories were coming back to her now she was waking up.

Her head was pounding as well. She needed coffee or painkillers or a potion or something, anything, just make the headache stop. It felt like someone had sliced the top of her head off and was viciously pressing their fingers down into her brain.

She must have groaned or looked pained because Draco noticed her discomfort. "You okay? Has the drink caught up? I knew you'd regret it in the morning." He sounded pleased with himself. Of course he did, she thought a tad spitefully, he was Draco sodding Malfoy he loved being right.

"Didn't try and stop me though, did you?" She spat out. Embarrassment was making her lash out like a cornered animal. She wanted to get out but she couldn't with him here and he clearly had no intention of moving anytime soon. Luckily, it was a huge bed. She was on the farthest edge; she shuffled a little moving even further away from him whilst still remaining on the bed.

"You wouldn't have listened darling." He drawled. She pretended like he hadn't spoken. There was no response or comeback to that remark for he unfortunately was right. Indeed she knew full well that if he had told her to stop drinking she would have drunk more just to spite him.

"Where's my wand?" She asked suddenly. She couldn't believe she hadn't thought of it before. She could Transfigure something into an item of clothing!

"In your rooms, probably." Draco said. "You didn't take it to the ball, did you? And I don't remember it...from last night."

He kept inserting barely veiled references about what had happened the night before into the conversation. It kept reminding her what she had done.

She wanted to get out of here, she had to leave. She was embarrassed and tired and hung over and humiliated and she probably looked awful right now.

She wanted to escape to her rooms and have a bath right away. She wanted to scrub away the feel of him, his hands against her skin. She could almost feel where he had touched her, as if it had left a sort of permanent mark. She felt dirty. She wanted a bath and clean clothes and then she wanted to escape to the library with a hot drink and a book and not emerge for a few hours. It didn't seem like this would be happening anytime soon though.

"Well have you got your wand?" She asked impatiently. She wanted to leave now.

He rolled his eyes, presumably at her stupidity. "Of course."

"Well can you please summon me some clothes or transfigure something or just...do something?" She finished lamely.

He smirked. "Of course I can my darling. Why didn't you ask sooner?"

She smiled sweetly and falsely. "I don't know. A silly oversight or something obviously."

He acted like he hadn't heard the veiled sarcasm lacing her words and picked his wand up from a side table his side of the bed.

"Accio Katie's robe." He said clearly.

There was a brief pause and then one of her robes, a lighter silky one which Narcissa had obviously intended to be used as a sort of dressing gown, flew into his outstretched hand. He passed it to her wordlessly, grinning sikily.

She struggled awkwardly to put it on without revealing any skin or getting out of the bed. It took her a minute or two but she finally managed it. He was watching her struggle with amusement evident in his eyes and a grin playing around his mouth. She ignored him pointedly. The second it was on she got up and made her way to the door.

His voice stopped her, just as she reached for the handle. "Kate, darling?"

"It's Katie." She said without even turning to face him.

"Well, Katie then..."

"Yes?" She wheeled round to face him irritably. He was still smirking.

"Thanks for a good time." He winked.

She stormed out, disgusted both with him and with herself

However, luck was clearly not on her side this morning, and she collided with Narcissa.

"Oh, excuse me dear." Narcissa said absent mindedly. She seemed to do a double take and her eyes focused on Katie's attire and the room she had just exited. Her thin lips twisted up into a tiny, satisfied smile. "I didn't hear you come in last night."

"It was late." Katie said. She didn't want to talk to Narcissa, she just wanted to go.

Why was his mother always there? Why did his mother have to catch her leaving his room in just a thin robe? It was obvious what had occurred last night, why did everyone have to know about it though? Narcissa was probably pleased that the line was being carried on or something like that...

Merlin. It hit her like a ton of bricks. What if she was...pregnant? She had slept with him a fair few times but obviously they hadn't been able to use contraception. It was against the law to do so. Nature would take its course soon and she would have his child. Oh Merlin. Quite naively, and now she thought rather stupidly, she hadn't really thought about the consequences, what would happen.

"Evidently." Narcissa was wearing this knowing look and Katie just wanted to curl up in a ball on the floor and die.

"Excuse me, I should go..." Katie trailed off, stepping to the other side of Narcissa and walking away. Thankfully, Narcissa let her leave and Katie ducked into her room.

Once inside, she shut the door firmly, found her wand and magically locked the door. She all but ran to her bathroom and ran the bath. She watched the water fill the tub, creeping slowly up the sides.

She let it run until the water was nearly at overflowing point. Then she climbed in. It was too hot but she relished the slightly uncomfortable temperature. She lay back for a few moments just concentrating on breathing slowly and calmly.

She reached for a sponge and scrubbed herself clean. She could almost feel his touch being removed as she did so. The water made her feel better. Her head was clearer now. The throbbing had subsided slightly to a dull ache.

She closed her eyes and leaned back again.

She wanted to get out of here, out of this house, just for a while. She had come to terms with the fact that she would be here for some time. She couldn't live anywhere else; she wouldn't even have anywhere to go. The Malfoy Mansion, although ridiculously opulent, had enough rooms that she could avoid Narcissa and Draco much of the room and it was comfortable enough. It was okay here really. But right now, she just wanted to get away.

Angie and Fred. They would be back now. The others were away at Hogwarts but Angie and Fred hadn't gone back. In fact, George hadn't gone back but she vaguely recalled someone telling her that Luna had. George would probably be around as well and because Luna wasn't there, probably quite pleased to see her. She would go to the shop, she decided. She could get out of the house, see her friends, maybe do some shopping. It would be nice.

If they weren't there, she would try both of their flats. Actually, she remembered now that George lived in the flat above the shop but Fred and Angie had moved out. Well, she would try their new place and if all else failed she would go to The Burrow.

She climbed out of the bath feeling much better. She used a charm to dry herself and found that clothes had been hung up for her. The house elves in this house were an invisible and incredibly helpful presence. She wondered where they stayed, she would like to thank them for being so helpful but she hardly ever even saw one and if she did she was always with Draco or Narcissa and unable to say something.

She pulled on a plain, navy dress (Narcissa had thrown a fit the one time she had worn trousers – she just couldn't be bothered with a battle of wills with her mother-in-law today, she would save the rebellion for tomorrow) and grabbed her wand.

She found Narcissa in the drawing room. She was sewing. Katie wondered, for a brief moment, why she didn't get the house elves do her sewing.

"Katie dear, can I help you?" Narcissa asked in her cool calm tones.

"I'm going to Diagon Alley today to visit some friends." Katie told her.

Narcissa's translucent eyebrows rose into her hairline. Katie wanted to laugh at how comical it was. She just about managed to resist. "Are you sure dear? I don't think Draco is about today..."

"Why does that matter?" Katie said, trying desperately to keep cool.

"Malfoy brides are not seen in public without their husbands or a chaperone." Narcissa recited dutifully as if quoting from some book on etiquette and stifling, outdated, stupid 'rules'.

"Well that's just great but this is the twenty first century and I'm going to see my friends. I would invite you along but I doubt you would enjoy their company and vice versa."

"These are centuries old rules. They cannot be broken-"

"I need to get out. I spend my days here doing nothing. I haven't seen my friends in a long time." Katie told her candidly. "I'm going. I'll be back in time for dinner, well probably." She was kind of hoping the twins and Angie would let her stay for dinner. She couldn't stomach another Malfoy dinner – too many courses, a weird silence, house elves moving silently around her, Narcissa's disapproving looks as she ate, Draco's smirking, knowing looks. She couldn't deal with it today.

She left, shaking slightly with a combination of anger and relief. She left through the gates and Apparated the second she was outside the grounds. Apparently, you couldn't Apparate onto or away from the Malfoy property.

She arrived in Diagon Alley right outside of the twin's shop. George's face appeared at the window and she saw him turn and yell to someone, presumably Fred for within half a second, Fred's face appeared beside his.

They opened the door and said in perfect unison with matching grins. "Long time, no see Kate. Come on in!"


	79. George and Luna 7

**A/N: George and Luna for Lunaclaw14, Reader-1996, LovelyRoses, MidnightIsCalling,****Whisperheart, gWeasley77, Bergere, Rosalie-Hale-Culllen, aribaconpolarcat, mishafoo,****Harrypotterlover56, SakuraHarunoGurl and goldeneyes20601**

**Disclaimer: This ain't a love song...this is a disclaimer.**

George x Luna

Before the war she had never been to the hospital before in her life. Her mother had insisted on giving birth to her daughter at home. Her father had always tended to any injuries she may have received.

After the war, she went several times. Her friends were in that place, her classmates, people she knew and loved. She went to visit some of them. She never liked it much though. She saw pain and anguish and disease. She saw horrific injuries and faces that were pale, too pale. She saw relatives break down and cry, holding onto each other, themselves, sliding down onto the floor to choke out sobs of grief and anguish, she saw patients frozen with grief, faces permanently contorted into masks of pain, she saw pain, everywhere was pain.

And so for her St Mungo's was a place of pain and unhappiness.

She had never been able to see the happier side of the hospital. However, standing here holding tightly onto George's hand and waiting for her first scan, she was beginning to think that maybe St Mungo's was not quite so terrible as she had thought.

She had been scared just entering the building. She had held very tightly to George's arm, he hadn't even complained even though she must've been hurting him. He had simply reassured her, in that calm way he had, that everything would be fine. Besides, he had added, she did want to see their baby, didn't she?

Of course she did.

She was a little worried about it all though. Luna knew full well that she wasn't regarded as a strong, confident person. It was true, she wasn't really like that. She didn't feel old enough to have a baby.

In the wizarding world, it was very common for wizards and witches to marry young – her own parents had married when her mother was seventeen and her father nineteen – and to have children soon afterwards. However, she still felt odd having a baby now.

She was still in school! She would, thankfully, just about have finished her school year by the time she actually gave birth to the baby. Some of the others would not be so lucky. Hermione would have her baby before even the final exams.

Luna knew she was lucky. She would have an education and a loving husband (yet another thing that poor Hermione was lacking) when she had her baby. Her baby would be loved unconditionally by both of its' parents. This baby would have a whole plethora of uncles and aunts and grandparents and cousins to love it.

This baby would be perfect.

She was actually very excited to see this baby. She really wanted it, wanted it more than she had ever wanted anything else in the whole wide world. This baby, this baby which would be hers and his – George's – half him and half her. How could this baby not be perfect when it was half him?

She shifted her weight a little and George smiled down at her. "You okay?"

"Yeah." She said, smiling back without even really realising or meaning to. He just had that effect on her.

She'd never thought of herself as that sort of girl – the kind who melted at a boy's smile or obsessed over his laugh – but she had found that actually she really was. She didn't know whether the charms placed on the marriage contracts had something to do with this. She didn't think so though.

Feelings like this, overwhelming, scary, lovely feelings, well they could only come from finding true love. She hoped these feelings never went away. She never wanted these feelings to lessen or fade. She wanted to feel like this about him for the rest of her days.

"Weasley! George and Luna Weasley!" A Healer yelled loudly, she looked bored out of her mind.

George stepped forward, pulling her along behind him. She couldn't quite help a smile at her new name. Luna Weasley.

She'd never ever expected she'd become a Weasley. If, for some inexplicable reason, she had ever thought of becoming a Weasley, she would never have imagined it would be George she would marry.

The Healer ushered them into a small room leading off from the corridor. She had very dark hair and a tired face.

"Okay, Mrs Weasley," she seemed to get a little distracted then as she scanned her notes. "There are an awful lot of Weasleys about...where do they all come from?"

George and Luna exchanged amused glances.

The Healer blinked once, shook herself slightly and continued. "Anyway, if you would just lie down on the bed, Mr Weasley take a seat."

Luna lay down on the bed. It was made of a hideous olive green vinyl. It felt cold underneath her fingers.

George sat down obediently in the chair beside the bed. He leaned forwards though, perched right on the edge of the chair, and laced his fingers through hers.

The Healer sat down on a swivelling stool the other side of the bed. Directly in front of Luna was a large, blank screen.

"Now, if you just pull your shirt up a few inches..." The Healer said, looking at her school shirt. McGonagall had excused Luna from the school for a few hours to have her scan. She hadn't seemed very pleased about it but the scan did need to be done.

Luna complied and the Healer held her wand over her exposed stomach. She muttered a spell and there was a slight pressure on her stomach. It wasn't painful or especially uncomfortable, just a little odd.

"Does it hurt?" George murmured into her ear. The Healer didn't seem to notice their exchange; she was concentrating on something or other.

Luna shook her head. He leaned back a little, evidently satisfied.

"Okay, if you just look at the screen you will be able to see your baby. Would you like to know the gender?"

They exchanged glances and, in mutual agreement, shook their heads.

"No, thank you." Luna said. "It'll be better if it's a surprise."

The Healer looked startled, clearly most people liked to know their baby's gender. Luna had always liked a little spontaneity. It made life far more exciting.

"Okay, we have a heart beat there." The Healer paused and counted. "It's a strong heart beat and completely normal."

She began checking for various deformities and looking to see whether her baby had all four limbs and lungs or whatever. Luna listened avidly to every word. Her baby was perfect, she knew that already, but it was still nice to hear a trained professional clarify the facts.

She stole a glance out the corner of her eye at George. He seemed just as transfixed as she was, listening to the Healer but staring at the screen at their baby.

Their beautiful, perfect baby.

"Would you like a photo?" The Healer asked.

"Yes." They both replied, neither actually looking away from the screen.

Was this woman mad? Of course they wanted a photograph. Did she not know how many people they would force to look at this photo, how often they would bring it out, how often they would look at it and memorise every tiny detail of their unborn child?

The Healer nodded. "Okay." She turned to a little table in the corner of the room and took a small piece of glossy paper from a stack.

She pointed her wand at the screen and then at the paper and muttered a few words. The image began to slowly replicate itself onto the paper. The Healer waited a few seconds, shook it in the air as if allowing the ink to dry and handed it to Luna.

Luna held it out, George staring at it as well. They were both smiling without really realising it. Their baby.

She was overwhelmed with this sudden almighty surge of love. She hadn't thought she even had any more love to give, she thought it had all be used up on George and the Weasleys and Harry and Ginny (who wasn't a Weasley anymore technically speaking) and Hermione and Neville and Hannah and her father.

She's also heard that this love didn't actually come until you saw the real life, flesh and blood baby. She doesn't care. She loves this baby, her baby before it has even been born and she knows that she'll love it just as much, probably more, when it is placed in her arms.

She wants this baby to be here now. She doesn't want to wait a few months for him or her to be born.

She doesn't want to go back to Hogwarts now, how can she? Her whole world has changed. She had thought she wanted to have a career, do something meaningful. When she married George, she just wanted to do the same things but with him there as well. Now, now she has seen her baby, his baby, their baby, she just wants to have a baby.

It's not that she doesn't want a career or to finish her education, it's just that that sort of thing isn't important, not compared to being a mother.

Her purpose in life, she thinks now, isn't to make a difference or to research obscure magical creatures or undermine the Ministry. No, those things might still be part of her life somewhere along the line, but her real purpose in life is twofold and very simple. She was put on this earth to love George and to have babies. Preferably his.

She's prepared to put her plans on hold for as long as it takes to play this role. The mother and wife role. It's one she never considered playing but she has found it's the one she likes best.

She can't wait all those months. She wants to start now – being a mother.

She doesn't want to be at Hogwarts anymore. George was always insistent that she went but she misses him so much there and she knows he misses her too, she isn't really learning anything new just theories and boring things that she just doesn't care about, she doesn't see her place there anymore. She just doesn't fit in there anymore. She fits right here with George. It's where she's supposed to be.

They'd discussed it endlessly. It was just one year, less if you count holidays, one year of her life and then she'd have an education and qualifications for the rest of her life.

But she didn't need them. George didn't have any and he was doing just fine. The shop was flourishing and the twins were even thinking about expanding. They didn't need money; she had no need to get a job for the second salary. They would be okay.

She wants to be with him. They don't have long just being husband and wife before they become husband, wife and baby. Of course, they are both really looking forward to that, but still...this is the last chance they'll have to just be them.

She wants to have more time. More time just being them – Luna and George. She wants to help out in the shop, laugh with Fred, talk to Angie and go to Weasley dinners. She wants to cook him dinner and clean their flat and sleep in his bed every night instead of only every other night in those horrible chambers. She just wants to be with him.

She wants the baby, of course she does, she's so eager for the baby and judging by his expression, so is he. But she also wants him. They're the two loves of her life.

She'd been so consumed by her thoughts she barely noticed that they'd that left the room now and were heading out of the hospital.

They emerged onto the crowded street. Luna stopped, pulling at George's hand. He turned to face her.

"What's wrong?" He asked worriedly.

"I'm leaving Hogwarts." She told him in a matter of fact tone.

"What? No... you have to stay." He's worrying about her education, she can tell. Underneath that initial concern though, she can see something else, another emotion just underneath the surface – a combination of relief and joy.

"I don't need the qualifications. Nothing I ever do in life will need a NEWT in Transfiguration or whatever else. You and I both know that." She explained carefully. He smirked a little, acknowledging the truth of her words. "I just want to be with you."

He grinned happily and pulled her towards him and right up into her arms and she knows she has made the right decision because this is exactly where she belongs, here in his arms.


	80. Harry and Ginny 7

**A/N: Harry and Ginny for BrightMikal (x6 – for each of the six reviews!), Kris77, thedevilandgod, x8jessica8x, mishafoo, HollyIShort, carly4713, lovenotwarXo, peacelovecolleen and Mint and lemon.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. But I do have a VHS of the first films, it's pretty epic and the special effects...well, they're pretty epic ;)**

Harry x Ginny

"Wizarding Hero's Torment!" The headline blared in huge black letters. They were unmissable and readable even from a difference.

Underneath was a slightly smaller title reading, "Ministry's betrayal of The Chosen One, Harry Potter, and his wife, Ginevra!"

Harry smirked and continued reading down the page. He wasn't the type to play up his war heroics, in fact he didn't really like talking about it, but this was a situation when a mention of what he had done was required.

"Yesterday, wizarding hero Harry Potter, in a series of interviews given to various publications, revealed that the Ministry has cruelly betrayed him and his new wife, Ginny Potter (sister of another member of the Golden Trio – Ronald Weasley).

The couple first made headlines when they were assigned to different partners despite the fact that they were in a previous relationship. They were cruelly forced apart by the highly controversialMarriage Law. However, the young lovebirds ran away together on the day of Ginevra's marriage, evaded Ministry capture for several days despite numerous highly trained Aurors being dispatched to locate the pair, and were married.

They were questioned by Ministry officials but were pardoned and the marriage was classified as legitimate.

The pair thought this was the last word on the subject and settled down to enjoy life together. Both returned to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry to retake their final year. However, both began to experience severe head pain which has only increased in intensity. They finally discovered that this pain occurred when they were together and was increased by physical contact. The pain is said to be so excruciating Mrs Potter has experienced several black outs.

Harry said, "The pain is constant, a little niggle which is always there, I've had worse but when we touch, it's unbearable. It's forcing us apart. We can't even hold hands."

Third member of the Golden Trio – Hermione Zabini nee Granger – threw herself into research in order to find a solution to the couple's ordeal. She discovered that the Ministry had activated the former marriage contracts which assigned Harry to Lavender Brown (who is now betrothed to Mr Dean Thomas - he made headlines earlier this month when he was the only person in the country to get his initial marriage overturned) and Ginny to Lee Jordan, who has been missing for a total of eight days and is rumoured to have joined a rebel group.

The Adultery charms placed on these contracts recognise Harry and Ginny as already married to other people and therefore, regards any meeting of the two as cheating. This is the cause of the pain. However, the pair are legally married to each other, not to Miss Brown (who, coincidentally, does not experience this pain despite being engaged to another man) or Mr Jordan, who was unavailable for comment last night, and are appealing to the Ministry to destroy the original contracts and allow them to be together.

They say they have contacted the Ministry but no action has been taken. An appeal has also been made by Hogwarts headmistress - Professor Minerva McGonagall - who spoke directly to the Minister of Magic, Kingsley Shacklebolt, however the contracts are still in place.

Harry had this to say. "This is a direct betrayal by the Ministry. We did our bit in the war, me and Gin, I think we deserve this much. I love her, I just want to be with her. This is cruel and unjust. The Ministry is obviously seeking revenge because we humiliated them by running away but it's petty and malicious. I've worked with Shacklebolt on several occasions and I always thought he was a good person. I thought he was the sort of person who could run our country. Evidently, I was wrong. He has shown his true colours here. He will, undoubtedly, claim that he has no knowledge of any of this. But he's lying, somewhere along the line, he will have had knowledge or actually ordered this."

Ginevra added. "The Ministry said we were free to go, they said we were married legally and then all this happens. It's ridiculous."

Harry Potter, as you will undoubtedly know, defeated Lord Voldemort in the Battle of Hogwarts, which claimed many lives and injured hundreds. Ginevra is also a war hero in her own right and comes from the Weasley family, which is known for it's active participation in fighting for the right side during the war.

Harry finished with an appeal. "I am appealing to the Ministry to resolve this, to remove these charms upon on. I am appealing to Kingsley, to the brave, good Auror I used to know, if you're in there somewhere then come back to us, be a good person again. And I am appealing to all of you wizards and witches out there, please, help us out. The Ministry has to do something."

The Daily Prophet is heading a campaign to have the charms removed from Mr and Mrs Potter. To join our campaign, send your name and address to our offices, these will be added to a petition which will be sent direct to the Ministry."

Perfect, Harry thought. He hadn't been sure about going to the media. They'd written a lot about him before and he'd never been able to see them as the good guys. But this, this was exactly what they needed. Maybe the media could be a force for good.

Now, the entire wizarding world would know about their situation and hopefully, act upon it. The Ministry would be humiliated into taking action.

"Harry!" A voice came from the fire, Harry jumped and his hand flew to his wand. A split second later, Percy Weasley's head appeared in the Gryffindor common room fireplace, Harry relaxed again. Ron and Padma looked up as well from the sofa where they were sitting. Ginny was with Hermione in the library.

"There you are." Percy looked relieved. "Kingsley's not happy."

Harry smirked and Ron chuckled. "Good. What's going on at the Ministry?"

"Well, everyone is talking about it of course. A lot of the other departments, ones that aren't connected with the marriage law or the Minister's office, have demanded the Minister do something. And, the Minister's office has been bombarded with Howlers and letters. It's a nightmare."

Harry noticed, with a little regret, that Percy looked very dishevelled. He usually looked pristine. However, his cloak was lopsided, his hair was sticking up at odd angles (a little like Harry's own actually) and he had smudges of what looked like ink, or soot, on his left cheek.

"Yeah, sorry about that." Harry said, not feeling especially sorry. "Guess you have to deal with them?"

Percy nodded. "Yeah, it's been a long morning. My desk's been on fire three times already." He wiped his face with one hand. "Anyway, I reckon they're nearly ready to crack. Maybe one more day like this morning and the contracts'll be destroyed before you know it." He grinned at Harry.

"You think so?" Ron said, sitting up even straighter and accidentally nearly pushing Padma off the sofa.

"Yep, the Minister's been in a meeting with a load of important people – couple of the Wizengamot, department heads, his inner circle. Some of them will have known about this, some won't. It's all they've been talking about all day. Look, I've got to go back, I just dropped in to let you know what I know. I'll keep you posted, if I can."

"Thanks." Harry said fervently wondering why on earth Percy Weasley had ever been his least favourite Weasley brother - the man deserved a medal at the very least. "See you."

"Bye." Percy's head disappeared.

Ron grinned. "Sounds like good news mate."

"Yeah, I'm gonna go find Ginny. Tell her the news." Harry said, getting to his feet. Ron nodded and Padma smiled.

He dashed to the library, swerving and dodging other students and the occasional Professor. He noticed that a lot of the students had the Daily Prophet and were all reading it. Some people shouted out their sympathies as he went past, he didn't bother stopping to reply.

"Gin!" He said, sliding into a chair on her table. Hermione sat the other side, surrounded by heavy text books.

"What is it?" Ginny said, touching her head for a second. It took a few seconds for the two of them to adjust. Whenever they were together now, even if they weren't touching, it hurt. The first few seconds was always the worst, it took a few moments for each to adjust to the pain and to continue.

"Percy Floo-ed us. Apparently, the Ministry's been hit with loads of Howlers. They've been in crisis talks all morning. Percy reckons they'll destroy the contracts soon." Harry said very quickly and all in one breath.

Ginny grinned, "Really? That's great!"

"I know. We can be us again."

Hermione smiled as well. "That's really good news. I really didn't want to go to Plan C."

Ginny giggled. "Really? I rather fancied it, I've never broken into the Ministry before."

Harry laughed, "Wish I could say the same. It wasn't much fun the first time though. Have you two seen the article?"

"No." Hermione said. "Ron says he's 'in it' though."

"He is. So are you." Harry replied. "It says Ginny's Ron's sister, and there's some stuff about the research you did."

Hermione looked rather pleased with herself.

"Yeah, thank you again for that." Ginny added. "We would never have figured it out without you."

Hermione flushed faintly. "It's no problem. I just wish I had something else to do now. I keep thinking about things."

Harry gave her hand a quick squeeze. "You know we're here no matter what. If you want to talk, you know where we are." Ginny nodded her agreement.

"Thanks." Hermione said quietly. "But talking doesn't help anymore. I'm gonna go to the kitchens, I'll see you later."

"D'you want us to come?" Ginny asked, rising to get up.

Hermione shook her head and Ginny sunk back into her seat. "You're alright, stay here and talk. I know you're dying to." She flashed a brief smile at each and exited the library.

Ginny sighed. "I wish we could help her. She doesn't look right, she's too thin...especially with the baby."

Harry nodded, he too was concerned about his friend's welfare. "I told her about that but she just didn't seem to care. Has she told you about that Healer? The one that tricked her?"

"Yeah, I sort of think the Healer did the right thing though. She made Hermione care about the baby a bit. I honestly thought she was going to do something to hurt it just to spite Zabini."

Harry frowned slightly. "Really? You think it's that bad?"

"N...not anymore. I think she's...well, I think she wants to keep it."

Harry's eyebrows shot up into his hairline. "Really? That's great."

"You think so?" Ginny cut in.

"Well yeah, don't you?"

"Kind of." Ginny admitted. "She does need to accept that she's having a kid and then at least two more. And it would make my day if she stood up to Mrs Zabini and Blaise because she definitely needs to. But, well this baby...it's going to look like him and I don't know if she'll be able to cope with that. And, obviously we'll all be here, but she will be on her own a lot of the time. She's never really been the maternal type...she never even wanted kids."

Harry nodded thoughtfully and without thinking, took Ginny's hand. Both recoiled instantly, hissing with pain and frustration.

"Merlin's sakes, this is ridiculous!" Ginny slammed her hands down on the table angrily, ignoring the loud noise and the irritated looks this garnered from the rest of the room.

Harry nodded. "I hope they end this soon."

"Me too." Ginny said quietly. "Me too."


	81. Percy and Cho 6

**A/N: For LovelyRoses, nikkila, Cassidy98, mishafoo, sonea91, Fernsong and thedevilandgod.**

**Darling readers – sorry about the lack of regular updates, I am now back at school and pretty busy. It's also not long until exams begin so I will have even less time to write. I'll try my best to write regularly but I can't promise everything.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Percy x Cho

"This is weird, isn't it?" She said shrewdly, setting her fork down by her plate.

Percy chuckled. "Yup. People keep giving us side glances."

She smirked, "Well at least we make them feel better about their own relationships."

"Yeah, at least they're talking." He said, surveying the restaurant discreetly from his seat. They were indeed one of the only couples hardly talking. People kept staring at them, little side long glances, as if wondering why on earth they weren't speaking to each other.

Truthfully, they didn't have much to say to one another. Since Cho's decision to embrace married life and his acceptance of the fact that they were in this for a long time, maybe forever, they had taken a few very tentative steps into an actual relationship.

He had taken her to The Burrow for dinner. His parents had been the only people there for a change so they had been able to really talk and get to know one another. He knew that his mother rather liked her now she knew her. Molly had been quite open in her dislike of Cho initially. Arthur, in his typical bumbling fashion, had discovered, much to his delight, that Cho had taken Muggle Studies and had been rather good at it. He had made her sit next to him at dinner and explain, in far too much detail, exactly where electricity came from and how on earth Muggles could use wind to get it.

They had also been out for lunch a few times. This had been rather difficult because Percy was absolutely inundated at work. The Harry and Ginny saga had hit the headlines and the entire wizarding community was outraged.

Percy suspected that most of them weren't actually as bothered as they said they were – they just needed to vent at the Ministry and this was the only outlet for the emotion. A lot of people were angry at the Ministry. Sure there had been a slight shift – a lot of couples were now happily matched and the resistance had died down a little– but there was still a lot of hatred for the law and for the Ministry. In fact, a lot of wizards and witches were angry at the Ministry, not about the law.

Kingsley had become a public hate figure, worse than even Fudge in his day. However, he seemed to have resigned himself to his fate, he maintained all along that he knew how unpopular the law would be but that it was a necessary measure. Percy felt sorry for him. Shacklebolt was a good Minister. He had a lot of admirable qualities and had made a lot of very good decisions. However, this one law had overshadowed everything else he had done. Recently he had made some crucial changes to the werewolf legislation; a fund had been set up to provide Wolfsbane Potion to the affected. Hardly anyone had even mentioned it; the Marriage Law had overwhelmed this event.

This, however, was Percy and Cho's first dinner date. It had been...awkward. Neither really knew what to talk about.

"So, tell me about your work." Cho said finally, resting her elbow on the table and her chin on her hands.

She didn't care much but this was essential to their relationship. If they were going to be together, she would probably spend a lot of time listening to him and in turn he would listen to her. She knew full well, as did he, that neither cared much about what the other had to say. Perhaps, one day, that would change and they would have shared interests or even an interest in the other's activities.

Perhaps.

She wanted a future with him. Well, not so much with him, but she had realised that this was the only future she was going to get. It was her future and she had to take control. Some of it was set in stone – get married to Percy and have at least three children with him. However, there were still elements she could control. She still had choices to make and things she could change. She was still able to make decisions and change her future to suit her.

She had decided that she would make her future a good one. If this meant making a few compromises and pretending to be interested every so often, well...it was a small price to pay really.

She wanted a loving husband, a perfect family. She would have this with Percy. She would.

Percy grinned and began to talk eagerly. "Well, it's a bit of a nightmare at the moment. Everyone is outraged about Harry and Ginny...did you hear about that?"

Cho blinked, a little startled, usually Percy delivered monologues with no interruption from her and he never changed the subject, ever. "Yeah," she said slowly. "But I don't really...well, I don't understand it all."

"What don't you understand?" He asked.

"Well...I don't get how the pain works. I mean, I don't get why they experience pain."

"It's the anti-cheating charms. The contracts think that Ginny is married to Lee and Harry to Lavender. They see Harry and Ginny's relationship as cheating. The charms cause the pain."

Cho nodded, "But Harry and Ginny are legally married."

"Yes but they never signed a contract between the two of them. The contracts are stronger than a normal marriage certificate."

"So...the marriages...like ours...well, it's different to...theirs?" Cho said slowly. She didn't quite understand – where Harry and Ginny married in a different way to everyone else?

Percy shook his head. "No, we just signed a magically bound contract whereas they signed a legal one. There's has no obligations. For example, they don't have to meet up at all if they don't want to and they aren't legally required to have kids."

"But in the papers, they said about they were breaking the law."

"They are, technically. Their certificate doesn't force them to be like the rest of us but legally, the actual law states pretty much what the contracts say."

Cho nodded. "I understand now. I feel so sorry for them."

Percy nodded glumly. "Me too. They're hoping the Ministry will crack soon."

"Will it?"

"I don't know. At first, well...I thought they would but...it's been three days and the Ministry has done nothing. I just don't know what's going to happen."

Cho pursed her lips. "I can't believe the Ministry would do something like this."

"Me neither. This isn't the kind of Ministry I wanted to be part of. Kingsley is a good man, he will have known about this but...I don't think it was all his decision. He's surrounded by a lot of powerful people...some of them have a lot of influence."

"So, Kingsley's advisors are corrupt?"

"Not corrupt, just too powerful."

"Well, why can't Kingsley do something about it? Limit their power somehow."

"Because without them he doesn't have enough influence to hold the Ministry together." Percy explained sagely.

Cho thought for a moment. "So...Kingsley's like the figurehead and these advisors make all the real decisions?"

This was good, they were talking. Really talking. Clearly politics was a huge interest of Percy's, she wasn't going to lie she quite liked having someone to talk to about current affairs. She liked that Percy was more knowledgeable as well, he could explain things to her. She'd always been interested in this sort of thing, however her friends had made it quite obvious that politics was not a cool thing to like and so she had pretended that she had no interest.

"No." Percy denied. "Kingsley still has a lot of influence but some of the decision making is mostly done by one or all of them, yes."

"And what d'you do? At the Ministry?"

Percy grimaced. "Everything."

"Define everything. Be specific."

"Well, I take notes at every meeting the Minister has. I write them up and usually just file them away because no one actually wants to read them. I do any research, or make sure it's done by someone else, that the Minister wants. I do things like get coffee. I get all of his post sent to me and then I sort through it all and get rid of the rubbish. I organise the Minister's diary, check all his accounts in to the Finance Department. I basically organise everything he does." Percy smirked.

Cho looked unimpressed. "So...you're like a glorified tea boy?"

Percy stuttered for a few moments, too shocked to even form actual words. Cho smirked.

"N-no...actually, I'm a key worker at the Ministry." Percy folded his arms across his chest self righteously.

Cho couldn't help it – she laughed. Percy seemed really offended at first but within a few moments, his lips too began to twitch and he laughed as well. The other couples in the restaurant glanced their way, drawn by the loud laughter, and then turned away evidently satisfied that at last these two were acting like a real couple.

"Sorry." She said between fits of laughter. "It just made me laugh how you were all...offended."

He grinned, "I know...my family take the mickey all the time."

"Do they?" She said, hoping that Percy would elaborate and help further the conversation. She didn't want it to die now, they were doing so well.

"Yeah. I'm the butt of most of their jokes. I don't mind though."

"Well, why? I mean...it has to get to you sometimes, right?"

She had decided that conventional first date rules didn't really apply in this case. And so, this was why she was asking personal questions which entirely overstepped the boundaries. She figured he would either answer and she would get to know him better or he would say he didn't want to talk about it in which case she would know not to refer to it again or to bring it up when they were closer.

He paused for a long moment and she wanted to take the question back. She shouldn't have asked...it was rude and personal. She was just about to apologise when he began to speak.

"Sometimes it does. But...well, you probably don't know what happened in the war?"

She shook her head.

"Well, I left." He winced. "I walked out on them all. It began with Fudge. He was denying that You-Know-Who was back and I believed him. Well, I just didn't want to believe that he really was back and so, it was easier to believe Fudge's story. I walked out on them when the family began to openly support Dumbledore and Harry. When they were right...I was too proud to come home. I just couldn't admit I had been wrong, that I had put my faith in the wrong people. It was during the Final Battle that I finally came back. I realised that I wanted them back and that if something happened, which thank Merlin it didn't, well...I just wanted to be a Weasley again. Every day I thank whatever is out there that they found it in themselves to forgive me." Percy finished quietly. Cho tactfully looked away for a moment to allow him time to compose himself.

"So...that's why you take it, the jokes and the teasing...out of guilt?"

"Partly, of course I'm guilty...something could have happened to any one of them, they were right in the firing line and I wasn't there to protect them. But...well, before I left they teased me as well. Now when they joke, it feels like things never changed...like I never left."

"But..." Cho said softly. "You did leave. You can do things differently now, you said to me it took you a long time to find your place...why does your place have to be this one?"

Percy blinked. "This is my place, Cho. I don't care that I'm the one the twins tend to prank or that they laugh at my work or that they tease me mercilessly...that's what family is all about. I don't care that they do all that stuff. I don't get offended because I know that they love me, as I love them."

Cho smiled. "Good, and you do fit in. I know you don't always think you do but...you do. I've watched you, your place is with them."

"And with you." Percy mumbled, flushing a violent shade of red in embarrassment.

Cho grinned. "Yeah, looks like it, Weasley. I think we're in this for the long haul."


	82. Oliver and Alicia 6

**A/N: For thedevilandgod, Reader-1996, lovenotwarXo, peacelovecolleen, xxxDREAMHEARTxxx and Grey Eyed. **

**Disclaimer: Harry Potter does not belong to me.**

Oliver x Alicia

It had begun well.

They had decided that they were going to work on their friendship first. Both had admitted, in a very awkward heart to heart conversation which had only lasted about fifteen minutes because both were too embarrassed to continue further, that they wanted this to work but neither was prepared, or even wanted, to start an actual relationship yet. Neither had mentioned the kiss, both were sort of pretending it hadn't happened. According to the law, they still had to sleep together on a regular basis but that was different to their friendship. It was like a separate thing. The two relationships hadn't merged yet, maybe it would be years before they did.

They were going to be friends and go from there. Both had also decided not to push anything, things would flow naturally and if they ended up being more like a couple then so be it, if they didn't...well, they would at least be friends and that was enough for both.

They had been out a few times. It was difficult to organise because Alicia was studying at Hogwarts and Oliver had a lot of training practices. However, McGonagall had (albeit, rather begrudgingly) allowed her to attend one of Oliver's Quidditch matches.

She had been, despite herself, incredibly proud that he was her husband. He was undeniably phenomenally talented at what he did. He looked right up there, swooping and diving, his attention focused on the Quaffle but also at everyone else. He was concentrated on his job but also on the progression of the game, this was what had made him such a good captain at school. She'd been a little awed at just how good he was. She'd always known he was good at the sport but he was so passionate about it...it astounded her to see how right he looked.

They had also met up on another Hogsmeade weekend and they wrote occasionally. They weren't long sappy love letters by any means. They were quick hello's, recounting a brief version of recent events, perhaps including a funny episode. They were light and friendly, both skirting around the big issues. They were both happy to have it that way. Neither wanted to address any of the various elephants in the room, it was much easier to simply continue on this weird sort of friendship.

Their friendship was rattling along nicely now. It was beginning to progress from an enforced friendship filled with stunted silences and awkward conversations to an actual one with occasional bursts of laughter and the odd smile.

Alicia had found that she actually quite liked Oliver. She'd always thought of him more as a captain, someone to look up to, rather than an actual friend. She'd found now that he was a good person.

He was passionate about his work, which considering she had no idea what she wanted to do, she found rather impressive. He was friendly and generally good natured. He made her laugh with his specific brand of dry humour. He was alright really.

Of course, they argued a lot. Usually she would say the wrong thing or disagree with him on something (he had a strong opinion on everything, literally every single topic that ever came up, and he hated being contradicted). She wasn't going to lie – sometimes it was her fault, she had a short temper. But sometimes it was his fault and he was equally as fast to get angry.

Although she didn't like to admit it, and he would probably drink poison before he ever admitted to such a thing, they were definitely rather similar on the whole temper front.

This was the third time they had met up in Hogsmeade. They usually wandered around for a bit – Oliver liked to look in the Quidditch shop and she often needed things for school – before retiring to The Three Broomsticks for butterbeer and maybe a bite to eat if they had enough time.

This was exactly what they had done today. They had been getting on pretty well and she was just thinking how nice it all was. They were getting on. They were talking and it wasn't awkward. There were no real long silences. It was good.

"So...have you heard about that Lee Jordan?" Oliver asked, swigging from his bottle leisurely.

"He was one of my best friends at school." Alicia reminded him. "I can't believe he's run off. Well...I can, but..."

Oliver nodded. "I would too, if I were him."

"I feel a bit sorry for her though." Alicia mused. "Pansy, I mean. She's been left twice now, that's gotta hurt."

Oliver snorted in an unattractive fashion. "She deserves it."

"So, you don't feel sorry for her?" The question was a loaded one.

"No." Oliver realised a moment too late that this was the wrong answer.

"It's not her fault."

"Urm...hello? Were you even at the battle?"

"Of course I was, are you suggesting I'm a coward?" Pah – how dare he suggest that her Gryffindor bravery was lacking?

She was getting red in the face now and a few people on the tables near to them were looking over. She ignored their curious stares. Anger tended to do that to her – she entirely disregarded anyone or anything around her and all sense of rational thought deserted her. Anger made her foolish and she often said or did things she regretted later. Of course, at the time, she couldn't have cared less.

"No." Oliver denied. "If you were listening..."

She cut in angrily. "I am listening! You're the one that isn't listening."

"Alicia, stop yelling. People are staring." Oliver hissed, catching her arm which she had thrown in the air with exasperation.

She yanked herself free of his grasp and shot him a hateful look. "I don't care who the hell is staring. I care that you think I'm some kind of coward though!"

Oliver sighed tiredly. "I didn't say that. I know you were at the battle. I was referring to the fact that Parkinson tried to turn Harry over. That was all."

"It didn't sound like that."

"Well it was. I don't want to argue, I've had a long day. It's been a hard week really and I don't want to argue."

"Let me guess, Quidditch has tired you out?" She said cattily, sarcasm lacing her words.

"Yes," Oliver said, not picking up on the sarcasm. "It has actually."

"Is that all you think about?"

"Well...no, of course n-"

"Because all you seem to talk about is that sport. Honestly, Oliver, no one cares. Ooh, big Quidditch hero...no one cares." It was a low blow. She wasn't even entirely sure why she was being so cruel but it was too late to apologise, too late to take the words back because she had made him mad now.

She got a twisted sense of satisfaction out of getting him angry too. He always acted so high and mighty and holier-than-thou...and yet, he lost his temper, he sunk down to her level too. That was probably why she did it, why she wound him up so frequently, to prove that he wasn't any better than she was.

His eyes were blazing with a furious kind of passion. "Actually, Quidditch is the most popular sport in the wizarding community."

"And you're a player for Puddlemere United. No one's even heard of them!" She said scornfully.

"And what about you, Alicia? Who the hell has heard of you? What have you done? What have you contributed to the world? You're hiding away at school and you know it."

She did it without thinking. It was as if her hand moved of its own accord, pulling her wand from her pocket and shooting a Bat Bogey Hex at him.

It took him a whole minute to find his wand (in fairness, he was being attacked by hundreds of flying bogeys) and remove the curse. A whole minute in which every head in the restaurant turned to them, a whole minute in which she sat frozen and immobile with regret, a whole minute in which she knew she had gone too far this time.

She hadn't even meant to. In the heat of the moment she had reacted the only way she knew how – with force. She had no words to deflect what he had said.

Because in those few words, he had directly addressed her innermost fear, brought it out to the public attention, forced her to confront it, poked fun at it. He shouldn't have done it. She shouldn't have done it.

Oliver rose to his feet, really quite gracefully, threw his napkin onto the table and left. He didn't even look at her although his face was frozen in an icy glare. The entire pub was silence, the only noise was the slam the door made as he stormed through it.

Alicia sat frozen in her seat for a long moment. Then, she got up and ran after him. Anger had propelled him along and he was taking huge, furious strides. She was running to catch up with him. She had no idea what she would say or do when she got to him, she just knew that she had to catch him. She had to do something. She knew if she just left him leave, let him walk away, things would never be the same again. Their friendship would be entirely obliterated, instead of just mostly destroyed as it was now, and it would never be rebuilt.

"Oliver!" She yelled. He didn't even pause or acknowledge his name being called. If anything, he quickened his already impossible pace.

"Oliver!" Nothing. She upped her pace to a sprint, ignoring the questioning or bemused looks she was getting from passersby.

"Oliver Wood!" She finally caught up to him and grabbed the back of his shirt. He stopped and spun round on the spot, forcing her to release her grasp on him.

"What?"

"I'm sorry." She said. "Okay. I'm really sorry."

"So?" He hadn't looked at her this whole time.

"Well, I said I was sorry! What more d'you want me to say?"

"Nothing. There's nothing you can say." His arms were folded across his chest in a closed gesture, it was a pretty obvious one as well – it was a little defensive, he didn't want her here, he didn't want her to come near him.

She took half a step back. "Look...I didn't mean to. You just made me mad."

"So?"

"Well I do stupid things when I'm angry, okay?" She said. She was a little angry still, why wouldn't he just accept her apology? She felt like a chastened school girl and it made her feel embarrassed. She was an adult now, she didn't need to be treated like a child.

"You should learn to control your temper." He said shortly.

"Yeah." She said. "And I am trying." This wasn't entirely a lie, she was trying, just not especially hard.

"And it's not working." He said maddeningly in an aloof tone. She hated it when he did that – acted like he was so much more mature and grown up and generally better than she was. It was exactly this act that made her want to make him mad. And when she had made him mad, he acted like this. It was a vicious cycle.

"You make me mad, okay? I don't know how you do it but you seem to know exactly how to wind me up. And you seem to know how to hurt me...more than anyone else does. I don't know how or why but you just get under my skin, okay? You just make me want to punch your face in half the time and the other half I want to kiss you senseless or both at the same time." She was a little embarrassed at what she had just admitted. Not enough to care though. It was the truth.

"Yeah, well you make me mad as well!" He said a little too forcefully for the conversation. "God dammit, I don't know how you just make me want to punch you."

Alicia nodded. "Yeah, well I feel the same!"

"Yeah!" He yelled back, taking a half step towards her.

"Fine!" She was moving closer to him without meaning to.

"Fine!" They were practically chest to chest now.

He reached out and pulled her roughly to her chest, she gasped at the abrupt action. He tilted her head back and kissed her, taking advantage of her momentary speechlessness.

It had begun well. It ended well.


	83. Fred and Angelina 6

**A/N: Fred and Angelina for mishafoo, Shanii21and Reader-1996.**

**Apologies for the long wait – life's been pretty busy. Exam week kicks off next week so I can't promise any regular updates. Sorry! Please do keep reading, reviewing and requesting.**

**I know it's very short and there's no dialogue, it's all feelings and thoughts and what has happened, but I think they need a chapter like this so that next chapter they can move on with their lives.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Fred x Angelina

Her baby was gone. Gone.

It would never ever see the real world. Never take a breath. Never see the sun. Never smile or laugh or cry. Never know its' mother or father. Never walk or talk. Never make friends or meet the family. Never go to school. Never fall in love or have children.

Her baby was gone.

She had been nearly two months pregnant which wasn't really all that long but she had loved that baby already. She had wanted that baby. They both had. They had been so excited. They'd looked at names and room colours and Merlin, they'd built a nursery.

She couldn't bring herself to even look at the room now. It seemed to taunt her, reminding her of what could have been, what would have been, what would never be. She'd shut the door to the nursery almost as soon as she'd arrived home. She couldn't face it, not yet. Maybe one day she would be able to go in but right now, it was all together too painful.

Sure, one day they would have other children but her first baby had gone.

She had wondered if it was strange to grieve for a child who had never lived but she couldn't help it. She just wanted to grieve for her lost child. It might as well as lived for all the pain she was feeling.

She wasn't even sure if it was the child she was grieving for or what the child would have been. Grim fantasies raced through her mind of her child – an odd but strikingly wonderful combination of her and Fred – living life, growing up and being happy. It taunted her, teased her, haunted her. The images seemed to be engraved on her eyelids because even sleep was not a respite. She merely dreamed of the things she saw during the day.

She felt like she was moving in a slow haze, as if the whole world was slowed down. People seemed to talk quieter and slower, she felt like every movement was sluggish at best and even the very air she breathed felt thicker and heavier. Everything felt wrong, tasted wrong, felt wrong, smelled wrong, was wrong, wrong, wrong.

She wondered sometimes, torturing herself, if it had been her fault. Perhaps she hadn't been careful enough. She should have done less, slowed down. It was too late now because the baby was gone and she would never get it back, never hold her child in her arms, never hear it cry or speak or laugh. Never. The never's floated around her head spitefully, a permanent reminder that her baby would never do these things. Her baby was gone.

Gone.

He didn't know what to do. He felt the loss, of course, but not as strong as his Angie did. Of course he didn't. The baby had been his and he had loved it, but he hadn't carried it inside him for two months. He hadn't had such a connection with it.

It hurt though, of course it did. He couldn't stop wondering what his child would have been like. It would have been a lot like him with a bit of Angie thrown in there – perhaps her brown eyes or her smile. It would have been the most perfect child in the whole world and no two parents would have ever loved their baby so much as him and Angie would have loved this child.

Their previous excitement and anticipation seemed to almost mock them now. They had been so happy. They were thrilled, ecstatic even and now it was crushed.

It was crushed in just a few heart breaking moments.

After the Healer had dropped the bombshell and left, they'd sat in stunned silence. Neither had been able to move, let alone speak. It was as if time itself had frozen. He'd held her hand even tighter and she was digging her nails into his palm so deep it drew blood but neither cared. The Healer had arrived back thirty seconds later with another male Healer who looked calmer, better rested. Fred had instinctively trusted him. This man knew what he was doing.

He'd confirmed what both of them already knew. The baby was dead.

It had all been a blur from then. Angelina had been kept in overnight. It had been terrifying seeing her looking so small and pale and fragile all alone in the cold, white hospital bed. They'd expected her to miscarry quickly and sure enough, she had that night.

It had been horrific. She'd woken up drenched in thick red blood. She'd screamed and cried and called for help. The Healer had calmed her and cleaned up and put her in a magically induced sleep.

It didn't matter though, she was calm but he, Fred, was still very much awake. He didn't know what to do with himself. He'd held her hand, although she couldn't feel it, and cried silent tears. He'd kept a silent vigil that night. He'd let himself imagine the baby and it's whole life – from birth to becoming a toddler, then a child, leaving for Hogwarts, travelling the world for a year, getting a job, marriage, kids. The whole thing. It would have been a perfect, blessed life. The baby would never lead such a life.

He hadn't cried again since that night. Angie, he knew, thought he wasn't upset about it and that frustrated and angered her and made her feel as if she was weak for grieving so openly. If only she knew. He was keeping it in to keep her strong. If he broke down and cried, she would never be able to hold it together. She needed to grieve properly and he needed to be her rock whilst she tried to make sense of it all. The baby had lived inside her, she'd carried it, she'd had a connection with her baby. She was hurting and he needed to look after her. He couldn't do that if he was a weeping, emotional mess. He needed to be strong for her.

They would get through this though. He knew that much. Angie was a mess right now and he wasn't much better but eventually the pain would lessen to the extent that it was manageable and they could go about their daily lives fairly normally. It would always be there – that pain of losing their first child. But it would fade, slowly. They would have more children, they would never forget this one but there would be others.

This child, this poor dead child, was forever an agonising part of their lives now.

It hurt to know that Angie was hurting. It hurt that he could do nothing about it. It hurt that his child, his and Angie's first child, was gone having never even lived a day on this earth.

She was crawling through slowly. The days weren't as black anymore. They were more a murky sort of grey, charcoal on the bad days. And she had bad days. She had days were she didn't want to get out of bed.

She did though. She was determined to live. She couldn't spend her whole life in bed moaning and wailing and weeping for her lost child.

The baby was gone. Gone forever. Of course it hurt, it hurt a hell of a lot, but the pain was beginning to lose its raw edge. That was good.

The pain had to go away someday. She knew that. It was a natural part of the grieving process that the first few days and weeks were the worst but that it did go away, eventually, slowly and over time.

She'd never stop hurting over the baby but she couldn't hurt this much forever, she'd never be able to take this amount of pain forever.

She'd begun to go out, to live, to see her friends. She could breathe again now. She was beginning to tread water instead of drowning in grief. It was better this way. She could begin to think about the future. Her future. It hurt to think it wouldn't be without this baby.

There would be other babies though. Strong, healthy, living, breathing babies who would kick their way into this world.

She had to think about them, about her future children. She had to think about Fred, her beloved Fred who had stayed so strong throughout this whole ordeal, who had held her hand through it all, who had held her oh so many times as she sobbed, who she knew was hurting just as much as she was but who was keeping so strong. She had to think about her future, that was what mattered.


	84. Lee and Pansy 4

**A/N: Not the most requested but just something I fancied writing, Lee and Pansy for wishing on a shooting star, HollyIShort, LunaPadma and FlutePower.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Lee x Pansy

She thought that maybe she was a bad person. Not a little bit bad, like most people were deep down if you looked hard enough, but through and through, downright, all the time bad.

She knew she certainly wasn't a good person. She'd never done anything good in her whole life. She'd never saved a life or helped out a person in need, she'd never comforted a hurt or distressed person, she'd never loved someone unconditionally, actually she'd never loved anyone. She'd never done anything brave or courageous.

She wasn't a good person.

But, was she so bad, so awful, so terrible that not one but two men would go out of their way to avoid marrying her?

She had had no qualms with not having to marry Dean Thomas. He was a Muggleborn and would have been a disastrous match; she would have been cast out of Pureblood high society, disowned from her family, never spoken of again, if she'd married him. She was actually glad he had found some sort of loophole and that the appeal had been successful. Admittedly, she was a little hurt, just a tiny bit, about the awful things he had said about her and the judgement she had seen on every face in that courtroom. It hadn't bothered her that much though. She was a Parkinson. Parkinsons didn't get worried about a few accusing looks from ancient people who didn't matter or some nasty words from a no one, Mudblood with no right to even possess magic.

Lee Jordan, however, although not someone she would ever have chosen to marry nor someone she especially liked, or even knew at all, would have been at least an acceptable match.

But no, he had run off to join a resistance group. Essentially, he would rather seriously endanger his life every single day, participate in criminal activity and desert his entire life, his family and friends, everything he loved, rather than marry her.

She wasn't that bad. Was she?

It was a conflicting situation. She didn't like Lee. She didn't even know Lee. She had certainly never spoken to him, at school she had known of him (he was Quidditch commentator and she had religiously attended every game to demonstrate her pride and loyalty to her house) but he had never crossed a single one of her thoughts. And she knew that she had never registered on his radar either.

He wasn't someone she would ever have chosen to be friends with. Hell, he wasn't even someone she would talk to.

The circumstances were difficult though. Completely out of the ordinary.

She had never expected to marry for love. From a very young age, she had been brought up to make a good marriage – a marriage that brought wealth, connections, an alliance, power. Whatever it brought, her marriage would be one of acquisition.

Even this one with Lee would have brought something – he was a war hero, well known and respected, people would have looked at their match and realised that the Parkinsons were a good family, a clean family who had never been involved with You-Know-Who, a family worth respecting.

It wouldn't have brought any monetary value or connections or the possibility of extended power, but it wasn't a complete nonentity.

She didn't know what would happen now. She had been informed, by the Ministry in an owl delivered letter, about Lee's disappearance the evening before it hit the papers. It was a big story. Lee was a fairly prominent figure in the wizarding world. He was a former war hero. He had run the popular Potterwatch rebel radio station. He was a good person. He had friends who worried about him, who had gone to see him and had found him gone, who had put two and two together and worked out where he had gone, who had alerted the papers. It was evidently all part of some scheme to drum up some support for the anti-law groups out there. It was working as well. There was a lot of support for the anti-law resistance groups at the moment, especially with the whole Chosen One Potter trauma currently lingering about as well, there wasn't a lot of liking, trust or support for the Ministry at the moment.

If it wouldn't be so utterly damaging to her social standing and her future inheritance, she would seriously consider throwing her lot in with one of those groups as well. They weren't especially effective but at least it would be doing something.

Of course, it was completely out of the question. It was illegal and dangerous and skilled. She was too law abiding, too dependent on her parents, too unskilled to do anything like that.

She had to stay here, in her supposedly perfect little world, and wait for someone older, better and probably male, to make a decision as to her future.

She picked up the letter lying on her dressing table and reread it again.

'_Dear Miss Parkinson,_

_We regret to inform you that your fiancée, Mr Lee Jordan, has gone missing, suspected of joining a resistance group. Unfortunately, the media have been alerted and the story will be published in newspapers from tomorrow. However, we have a highly skilled team out searching for him and we remain confident he will be found soon and brought to justice._

_Yours,  
Percy Weasley (Secretary to the Minister)  
On behalf of the Minister of Magic, Kingsley Shacklebolt'_

She didn't even know why she'd kept it. It was stupid and masochistic.

It was disorientating. She hadn't even liked Lee Jordan, why should she feel so betrayed?

For betrayed was exactly how she did feel, why had he done this? Was she so awful? Was she?

She suspected that perhaps she was. She wasn't a good person. She knew that. But she'd never thought she was that bad.

She didn't know how to be anyone else though. She had been brought up like this and it was too dangerous, too damaging, too scary to even attempt to change now.

The door opened and her mother stood in the doorway, haughty and imperious as ever.

"Mother." Pansy rose and turned to face her mother. As usual, her mother was wearing a dress with a cape like robe over the top, in the customary black and deep purple. It was her unspoken trademark.

"Pansy, what on earth are you doing hiding up here?"

"I have nowhere else to be, do I?" Pansy said, a little sulkily. An unmarried daughter was a dangerous thing to have these days, an oddity, a freak, an outcast. Her mother hadn't taken her out in days. She knew there had been events on – parties, galas, balls – and she hadn't been invited to any. Her own mother didn't want to risk being seen with her in case it damaged her social standing in some way.

"No, I suppose not. What are you wearing?" Her mother eyed her up and down critically and pursed her lips. "Goodness me, you have let yourself go. Why on earth are you moping?"

"I have nowhere else to be." Pansy repeated stubbornly.

Her mother's lips tightened dangerously. "You, my dear, are in a dangerous position and we need to remedy that. I have been thinking. You certainly cannot marry that criminal, whenever he is found, and so a more eligible husband needs to be found."

"There's no one." Pansy said quietly. "There all married already, Mother. The law has matched everyone up." There were no single wizards or witches around these days, everyone was married. She didn't like going out in public, wizard communities, like Diagon Alley, these days. On every corner was a happy married couple, kissing, hugging, smiling. Some were even pregnant. It made her feel sick with jealousy. It should be her. It would never be her. That door was closed to her now.

She was a spinster. A sad, lonely spinster, a permanent disgrace to the family, a freak to be laughed at by her peers, a warning to younger girls, someone to be spoken about in hushed tones and the subject of malicious whispers.

No one would ever want her.

"Don't be ridiculous. You're not thinking, my girl. Every eligible wizard in Britain has been married."

"I know." Pansy replied slowly, not understanding her mother's point.

"There are wizards in every country in the world. This is just one place."

"We're going abroad?" Pansy said eagerly. This was good. They would all move, the whole family, somewhere else, somewhere nice and they could be together again, they would find her a good husband, someone worthy of her.

Her mother laughed once dismissively and Pansy's imagined future faded away. "No, don't be ridiculous. Your father and I live here, Pansy. We're not going anywhere. You, however, are going away."

"You're sending me away?" Pansy said brokenly. They didn't want her. They were sending her away, alone and unwanted, to somewhere else where she knew no one, nothing.

"Well it's not quite like that. You're going off to France for...well, for a little while at least. You'll love it over there."

"A little while?"

"Well..." Her mother paused delicately before continuing in a saccharine sweet tone. "Until you are less of a disgrace to the family. To be frank we can't have you here at the moment. It's not beneficial to our position; you don't quite fit in here dear. In France, you are an unknown. People don't know about...about all this, the things that have happened. It's a fresh start. You can make new friends and meet someone worthy. Then, perhaps, you can return."

Pansy nodded, head lowered to the floor.

Her mother seemed to notice nothing out of the ordinary. "Now, dear, we'll need to have some new dresses made. A whole new wardrobe. A fresh new start demands an excellent first impression."

"I'll be alone."

"No, you won't. Your Aunt Alice lives there, remember. Well, she's very high up over there so I've heard, upper society as befits a Parkinson. She married a French wizard, very high up the ranks I've heard. Fantastic match really. She always was a beauty though, you don't have that advantage my girl, I never doubted she'd make a good match. She has agreed to look after you. You'll be living with her and her husband; she'll introduce you into society there and act as your guardian."

"Aunt Alice is in her eighties."

"Well yes technically she is dear, lovely woman though. She gets tired sometimes but still has the Parkinson get up and go spirit. Lovely woman." Her mother said distractedly, her attention already wandering away from her distraught daughter.

"Now, dear. Wardrobe wise, I'll let you go and order the dresses, fitting and whatever. I'm thinking dark greens, long sleeved remember and perhaps a pink for the evenings, a traditional black as well. Nothing too...extravagant or gaudy, remember." Her mother smiled sweetly, as if departing genuine motherly advice, and left.

Pansy sunk into her chair. They were sending her away for good. So admittedly her mother had said she could come back some day when she was married, but she doubted she would ever be welcome here again. They didn't want her anymore. They were cutting her off, just not in words, they were sending her away somewhere were no one would associate her with them. They would tell everyone she had gone to live abroad in France. People would very soon forget about her. Her parents would stop even mentioning her (although at first they would tell false boasts about various imagined suitors Pansy had or high up connections she supposedly had) and no one would ever remember her. She wouldn't be welcome back home unless she was married. And finding a suitor would be difficult, Aunt Alice was a elderly lady. She had been a true socialite in her youth but no longer. Alice was an old lady now, not interested in parties or dinners or fine clothes. She, Pansy, was going to end up stranded in France, not speaking the language, with an elderly couple who never went out.

Maybe this was her punishment for being a bad person. Maybe. Was she really this bad?


	85. Dean and Lavender 4

**A/N: Right, sorry about the long wait for updates. Exams are now over (for a little while at least!) and I should have more time to write. **

**However, my 'darling' father wiped the computer and deleted everything including the drafts I had for the next few chapters, all the planning I had and my list of requests. This means I have no idea which couple were most requested so I'm doing this couple as they have the fewest chapters. I will begin again with the requests so please keep them coming in!**

**Thank you for your endless patience and your lovely reviews. You make my day.**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing.**

Dean x Lavender

"Do I look okay?" She asked Parvati for the third time that minute. She was fretting about the dress, about her hair, about her shoes. Last minutes nerves probably, even though her panic she knew it wasn't real, she was just worrying over nothing.

Parvati rolled her dark eyes. "Yes. You still look okay." She stressed, smiling slightly. She had been exactly the same on her own wedding day; she could still remember the heady rush of feelings, nerves, excitement and emotions. "You'll knock his socks off."

"You think?" Lavender asked worriedly. She'd decided to go for a traditional dress. Parvati had wanted her to with something a little more exciting but she hadn't wanted to. She and Dean were a traditional sort of couple who suited a traditional ceremony and therefore required a traditional dress. It was white and strapless and long. It was only the third dress she had tried on but she had fallen in love with it when it was still on the hanger. Parvati had been in charge of hair and her twin Padma (who had definitely softened towards her recently) had done her make up for her. Long curled hair, soft make up – the typical bridal type look.

It worked though, well she really hoped it did anyway.

Her wedding felt really quite special. She was glad now that she hadn't gotten married when everyone else had, the months of loneliness and jealousy at the other happy couples had not been in vain. Her wedding was to the man she loved. It was also a singular event.

Parvati had already bemoaned how boring her wedding had been, submerged amongst the tidal wave of other weddings. She had already gotten Seamus to promise to having another wedding in a year or two (she was going to have the twins as bridesmaids – Lavender was already looking forward to it).

Lavender, however, knew that her wedding was the first in a while. It had been some months since the last wedding had taken place and it would be many more months before anymore couples were married. Many young witches and wizards were creeping close to falling within the marriageable age bracket. Everyone was waiting with bated breath to see what the Ministry would do and whether it would continue the law.

She turned to look at her reflection in the mirror. She didn't really recognise herself at the first glance. It didn't look much like her. It was her, if you looked close enough you could see her in there, but she was swamped by dress and more make up than she normally wore.

These days she had definitely relaxed on the hair and make up front. It didn't matter too much, Dean preferred her natural and it was a lot quicker to get ready these days (something he was very pleased about). She preferred it herself as well, she liked herself natural. It fit her better, the new improved Lavender.

Parvati was acting as her chief bridesmaid but was insisting on being referred to as the matron of honour. She was wearing a long, soft pink dress, cut to flow softly over her burgeoning baby bump and was carrying a huge bouquet.

"Thanks." Lavender said quietly. T

he room had been busy, busy, busy just moments before, filled with Padma and her parents and Dean's little sister, all rushing around her and chattering excitedly. Now it was just the two of them – Lavender and Parvati.

The ceremony was due to begin in less than ten minutes and the church was probably already nearly full. She could almost see the last few people slipping into seats, bemoaning their back row status.

She'd already spoken to her mother, who had shed the obligatory few tears and said lovely things about how amazing she looked, her dad was waiting just outside the door for her.

It was just her and Parvati, her very best friend.

"For what?" Parvati looked a little bemused.

"For being here." Lavender said in a low tone. "I didn't know if we'd ever get to this point. For ages I thought I was gonna have to get married without you. I'm really glad that I didn't have to in the end."

Parvati smiled. "Never, I could be giving birth and I'd be here beside you."

"I'd rather you didn't go into labour here, terribly messy I hear." Lavender grinned.

Parvati chuckled. "So I've heard. You and Dean... have you talked about a family yet?"

Lavender nodded. "Yeah, a few times. He's going to move in with me, when we get back from honeymoon. We'll, you know...think about it more then."

Truth was they had agreed on it in an abstract sort of sense, talking about their futures in very general terms. They had agreed it contained a nice house, kids and a pet (although they had disagreed on this – he wanted something unusual and magically gifted like a salamander or a unicorn, she fancied a bog standard, ungifted, family dog).

They hadn't been very specific though. Actually, their entire relationship wasn't specified. They never really talked about the future or what they were or anything like that. They were two people, in love, who were going to get married and they hadn't thought much further ahead than that. Dean didn't want to put a label on what they had or what they were, he didn't want to look into the future, he liked the present, he had said he didn't want to plan their lives – he wanted to live them.

She fully understood his point, she liked his free spirit and spontaneity. However, quite honestly, she liked detail and specifics. She was learning to relax somewhat. Dean was so laid back he was almost horizontal and some of that was rubbing off on her, but a part of her still wondered if he ever thought about their future seriously, instead of just throwing general ideas about.

"Well, you'd better hurry up." Parvati said. "Because we don't want too big an age gap between our twins and your kids."

"Kids?" Lavender said in horrified tones. "Oh no, there's no way I'm having twins. Never." She suppressed a shudder at the mere thought of it. There was absolutely no way she would ever be able to cope with twins.

"Hate to burst your bubble, but you don't get a whole lot of choice about it." Parvati nudged her with a sharp elbow. "I hope you have twins now, just to spite you."

Lavender poked her tongue out childishly and Parvati giggled.

"Love you, Lav." Parvati hugged her tightly for a brief moment before releasing her so as not to crush her dress or ruin her make up.

"You too. Erm... shall we go?" She said a little nervously, looking towards the door.

Time was up. She was going to say goodbye to being Lavender Brown. In just a few short moments, she would be Lavender Thomas. She wasn't scared, not really. She knew what would happen next and usually it was only fear of the unexpected that made people scared in the first place.

She wanted to be his, officially.

(Unofficially, she'd been his since the very first date.)

Their relationship was strong and solid and loving. They didn't really need a piece of paper or a big fancy ceremony to prove it or to classify it. It would continue endlessly without a wedding. Sure it was nice to have one, but it wasn't compulsory, not really.

She took one last look at herself in the mirror and nodded once to herself.

She was ready to become Lavender Thomas.

She walked out, Parvati following silently and into her dad's arms. They exchanged a few quiet words and Parvati hurried them to the church doors, worrying about being late.

Parvati went in first, the music wafting out of the open doors towards Lavender. Butterflies stuttered into life – they weren't the fearful kind though, they were excited and a little nervous. She recognised her cue in the music and nodded to her dad. He took her arm gently and they stepped through the doors and into the cool church.

The church was beautiful, decorated with numerous flower arrangements (including a good deal of lavender – something Dean and Parvati had insisted on although she thought it was a little egotistical to include it). Lots of people had come, even a lot of the Hogwarts students who seemed to have been granted permission to be here. She even, with a jolt of surprise, spotted McGonagall in the front row. She saw Parvati standing her side of the altar and Seamus standing opposite her, resplendent in a black suit. He grinned at her and winked. She managed a half smile back.

She finally looked up to meet his eyes. Dean's. He looked at her and it was the look every bride hopes for. A combination of love, a big smile and a little helping of awestruck had merged on his face. She felt a huge rush of love for him. The aisle suddenly seemed far too long, she wanted to be with him already.

Slowly but surely, they made their way to the altar. Her dad handed her over, squeezing her hand tight for a moment before releasing her to Dean.

She wanted to spend the rest of her days with him. She'd stand by him in sickness and in health, for richer and for poorer, forever and ever. Nothing would stop her.

She was proud to say that she would be his forever. She wanted to stand up here in this church, surrounded by their friends and family, and pronounce to the world that she, Lavender Brown, was head over heels in love with one Dean Thomas. And that was exactly what she was going to do.


	86. Neville and Hannah 5

**A/N: For spring butterfly.**

**Wow. One thousand reviews. I never thought this story would go on for so long or get anywhere this number of reviews, I'd like to say thank you to everyone who has ever read, reviewed or requested. This story still has a way to go before the end, I hope you enjoy it.**

**I know that a lot of you wanted a happy ending for Neville and Hannah, I promise that they will have happier times soon but right now things aren't happy for them.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Neville x Hannah

Sometimes life was cruel.

For Neville, life was mostly always viciously, torturously, maliciously cruel. This, however, felt like the final blow. He wasn't sure he could recover from this, not this time.

Usually he was able to soldier on. He was used to pain, used to loss, used to unfairness. He could deal with his pain; he could work through it or pretend like it wasn't happening. This was too much. Way too much.

He was nineteen. Nineteen. And completely alone in the world.

Of course, his parents were still here in body but their minds, their minds had gone a long time ago, before he was even old enough to remember them. Now all he had of them where empty shells, vacant and lifeless with no memory of their own son.

And he had Hannah. Oh Merlin, Hannah.

She was the only thing he had left now. She was by his side, as she always was, as she always had been throughout all of this, and he was fully aware he was holding on to her too tightly. She didn't seem to mind though, even though he knew his nails were digging deep grooves in her palm. He couldn't quite manage to make himself loosen his grip though. If he let go, well he wasn't sure what would happen.

It wouldn't be pretty though whatever it was. He'd more than likely crumple to the floor and never get up again. Or he'd run, run far away from this and pretend like it had never happened.

He had to stay here and he had to stay strong. He had to.

She would have wanted it this way. Augusta. Gran.

She would have given some very unhelpful, unsympathetic speech about pulling his socks up and what it meant to be a Longbottom (stoic, brave, a fighter) and then she would have left him alone for a while and he would, admittedly, have gotten over whatever the trauma was and moved on. It was her way, the only way she had of dealing with things like this, and, surprisingly, it often worked.

A Muggle psychiatrist would have an absolute field day deciphering his mind. He had a lot of problems, most of which he had kept bottled up. It wasn't healthy to do so, so he had heard.

The war had shaken him far more than he would ever admit. He still had terrible nightmares of the things he had seen and the pain, always the pain, sometimes his own and sometimes etched on the faces of others.

And every single time he went to see his parents he ended up a crying mess. He missed them, well...perhaps not them as such as he had never really known them, but he longed desperately for what could have been, what would have been, what should have been.

He had a lot of issues. Merlin, how he hated that word. People threw it around a lot as if one simple, stupid word could sum up the true extent of a person's pain and suffering. It couldn't, he had found, it really couldn't.

"Neville," Hannah murmured. "The...the coffin's here."

A long black car, sleek and shiny, had just pulled up by the kerbside. He looked at it. It wasn't really his Gran's sort of thing. Wizards and witches didn't really have a traditional funeral service; mostly they just borrowed from the Muggles. You had to admit, for this one, the Muggles did have it pretty much covered.

The service was being held at a Muggle church and they were having a reception at the Leaky Cauldron. Hannah was working there now, she was a distant relative of the barman, Tom, and he had offered her work. She'd been reluctant to accept but, having a noticeable lack of other options, had decided to take it up. She really quite liked it although she never expressively stated so. He could just tell. He always could with her.

He nodded blindly at her statement. "'Kay."

"Do...do you want to be pall bearer?" She said almost apologetically. She clearly did not want to have to ask.

He nodded more firmly this time. "Yes."

His great uncle appeared by his side. "I'll do it as well."

Neville nodded and clapped his shoulder. His great uncle had been his Gran's brother, it was right that he should do this. They still needed two more though. The Muggle funeral directors had insisted on taking the back two places – protocol apparently, it was supposedly heavier or something.

Harry and Ron emerged from a small huddle of people clustered by the church doors.

"Um...we were wondering if you wanted us to, you know..." Harry trailed off awkwardly. "I mean...well, if that's what you want. We know we're not family or anything..."

Neville nodded. "It...I think she'd like to know that two members of the Golden Trio carried her...her." He couldn't quite finish the sentence properly. He could almost imagine his Grandmother's pride at having two members of the Golden Trio, including the Chosen One, carrying her coffin at her funeral. She'd probably explode with it.

Hannah squeezed his hand once. "I have to go in now; I'll be in the front row."

"'Kay." He released her hand. She walked into the church, turning to shoot him one last glance. She looked worried, he noticed, really worried. He'd been with her during much of the war - that was how they'd even became friends - but he'd never seen her as scared looking as she was now. She looked frighteningly pale and her entirely black ensemble only emphasised this fact. He knew that it was his fault. She was worried about him. He should do something to reassure her that he was okay.

He'd never been a good liar though. And he really wasn't okay.

The coffin was mahogany. Carefully, they hitched it onto their shoulders. It was light, feather light. He gripped the corner of it tightly with both hands. He had to hold onto something, someone, anything. It felt cool and smooth beneath his hands.

He heard music start up within the church. It was his cue. He stepped forward, feeling not seeing his great uncle step with him and Harry and Ron fall into line behind them. He could hardly see anything through the tears but he knew the church would be packed.

His Gran had been well known and respected (and definitely more than a little feared) within the wizarding community. Wizards and witches would have flocked from across the country to pay their last respects. People probably would have come for him as well, people like Harry and Ron who were here to see to ensure that he was okay.

Carefully, they set the coffin down on a sort of table at the front of the church, just behind the altar. It was encircled with flowers. It looked small, lying there. So small. Just like she had when she was lying in a hospital bed.

It looked wrong. Augusta Longbottom had never been small. She was feisty and forceful and filled the room. She wasn't quiet or subdued or small. She wasn't like that. This was wrong.

The reverend, a pleasant round faced man, stood up and began to speak signalling the beginning of the ceremony. Neville couldn't make himself concentrate on the words. He sunk into his seat on the pews beside Hannah. She slipped her hand in his and he held it tightly.

She leaned down and with one hand, because he refused to relinquish his grip on her other, took two handkerchiefs from her bag. She handed one to him wordlessly, clutching the other in her balled up fist.

He noticed that she was crying too, big fat tears. She looked so unhappy. She had loved his Gran too, admittedly she had been more than a little afraid of her, but the pair had loved each other in their own way. As he watched, she lifted the handkerchief to her eyes and wiped the tears away.

The reverend continued to talk about loss and love and God (which was faintly ridiculous as magical folk didn't believe in any kind of God). Neville could barely hear him. Tears obscured his vision, dripped into his lap, soaking through his black trousers.

He was alone. Alone. Alone. Alone.

A tiny part of him wondered exactly how much noise he was making – were his tears audible or silent? He wasn't even sure. He wasn't even sure if he knew how to stop crying, had he even cared about the volume of his sobs.

It didn't matter because she was gone. He had no one.

She had always looked after him. She'd always been there, no matter the time, to go to. She'd held him as he cried, provided for him, fed him, clothed him. He'd worked so hard to make her proud and in the end he had succeeded and in the process of doing so, he had become a better person, a stronger person. He'd made her proud.

That was all that counted. She was gone, and that was hard, really really hard and it would be some time before he ever got over that blow but...he'd made her proud. He'd done it.

The service seemed to be ending. He'd chosen to say a few words. He wiped his face self consciously with the hanky, dropped it onto his seat and stood up at the reverend's beckon.

A watery blur of pink and black looked up at him. He looked out at them all. From the corner of his eye, he could see the white of the discarded handkerchief in his vacant seat.

_Time to make her proud again Neville, he thought. She wouldn't want you to cry, she would want you to stay strong and do this. C'mon, make her proud._

"Firstly, I would like to thank you all for coming. I know that wherever she is, Gran would be very pleased that you all came. My Gran probably wasn't the most likeable person. I know she really wound some people up, ruffled some important feathers. But...but, she was the bravest person I ever knew. I know most of you will have experienced that bravery and will think the same as I do. She raised me, when my own p-parents couldn't. She fought through both wars and never let anyone defeat her. She kept fighting even when she was ill as we all knew she would. She never gave up. She d-died fighting and that's exactly how she would have wanted to be."

Short and to the point. He'd said it all in just a few words, there was nothing that could be added to that. He slowly walked back to his seat and sat down at an equally unhurried pace.

He'd made her proud and in the end that was all that really mattered.


	87. Blaise and Hermione 10

**A/N: Yes – a double update. It's a reward for all those lovely reviews!**

**This is for sonea91, Dark Child Production, cullen's pet and the other hundred or so people who had requested them before!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Blaise x Hermione

Her decision weighed heavy on her mind. She'd spent hours agonising over this. She'd thought about it almost nonstop ever since the scan – in lessons, when revising, in the library, all night every night. She'd weighed up the benefits and negatives. She'd thought it through thoroughly. She'd pondered each and every other decision, every other path had been thought about and eventually closed off. This was the only option.

She wasn't entirely sure she could do this but she did know that she had to try. She also had to tell her 'husband' of her decision. He wouldn't like it; she knew that much for sure. His mother would probably like it even less. She smiled slightly with bitter satisfaction at the idea of Mrs Zabini finding out about her decision. She almost wanted to be present just to see her stupid old face.

The law was on her side though, law and, of course, superior magical ability. She just had to tell him.

"Blaise." She said. She'd been waiting outside the Great Hall for him to emerge from breakfast. This was neutral territory.

He was standing with a group of his friends. He was always with them, part of the group and yet not part of the group at all. He never seemed to speak to them let alone confide in any one of them. There was no special closeness with any single member of the group. Indeed, his best friend (if he had such a thing) was Draco who had already left the school. He was always on the fringes of the group, accepted but not willing to be part of them. That was for sure – he could be one of them, it was he who had chosen not to, not them. She held onto that knowledge in the hopes that maybe deep down he was a somewhat decent person by refusing to get too involved with them.

He looked at her coldly. "What?" This was for the benefit of his so called friends. They were looking at her with a mixture of emotions – disgust, distaste, confusion. They were wondering why she was talking to him, what she wanted, why she was here.

"Can I talk to you?" She asked. "It's about the baby." She added very quietly so none of his cronies could hear. She could practically see them all straining to listen whilst pretending to be continuing their conversation.

He nodded curtly at his friends and strode away, his cloak swirling imperiously around him. She was forced to follow him. She hated that he did this, that he led the way, that he made her look so small and stupid following him around like a child. He was, silently, asserting his superiority. He was saying, without even speaking, that he was making the decisions, that he was in control. And she hated it, hated him.

He walked away from the main school (presumably in order to avoid hangers on and eavesdroppers) and into a deserted classroom. Rows of desks and chairs were lined up like silent sentinels. The room was faintly dusty, great clouds of it swirled in the air before them as their footsteps disrupted it. She wondered idly when it had last been used, obviously not recently. She'd never even been in this room before.

He stopped in the centre of the room near to the front professor's desk. She shut the door behind them. He turned to face her.

"Well, what is it?"

She paused to gather resolve. She could do this. She was Hermione Granger, no one beat her, no one. "I'm keeping it."

"What?" He blinked stupidly. She almost wanted to laugh at how comical he looked.

"I'm keeping the baby." She spoke a little louder and with more confidence this time.

"You can't." He said instantly.

She shot him a deathly glare. "Why on earth not?"

"Because it's my son." He said as if it should be obvious to her.

"You don't know that it's a boy." She said folding her arms defiantly. It was a boy but that was beside the point. "And anyway, I want to keep him."

"I don't even get why!" He snapped angrily.

She turned on him furious. "Because it's my baby too!"

"I'm the father, it belongs with me."

"It? It? You haven't even seen the baby and you know full well you won't look after him. Your stuck up mother will hire some nanny who you'll probably want to sleep with and who won't care about our baby. I'll look after him properly, like a real mother."

"It is my child. I don't want it raised by Muggles." His upper lip curled into a dark sneer at the last word as if it were particularly distasteful.

"See that is exactly what I'm talking about. You'll pollute the baby with your stupid, outdated Pureblood ideas. No child of mine will ever be like that. Ever!"

"We'll see." He said shortly. "The child is half mine. By law I will get joint custody which means at the very least weekend visits."

"Two weekends every month, actually." She replied defiantly. "I've looked it up."

"We have excellent lawyers, I'm sure they'll wrangle a better deal than that. And if it can't be done by law, well...we're not short of cash. Everyone has a price." He smirked at her satisfied that he had floored her. She looked duly horrified.

Clearly she was expecting him to lie down without a fight. Not likely. Not bloody likely. This child was half his. It needed to be raised correctly as a proper Pureblood (even though the child would unfortunately be half-blood) without influence from its' Mudblood of a mother.

It needed guidance and a proper upbringing. It needed to be taught about life and he and his family needed to be the ones to do it. There was no way that Hermione sodding Granger would ruin his child with her foolish talk of how Muggles and wizards were equal and how Muggleborns were just as good as Purebloods. No way.

Her mind was spinning. Was he bluffing? He certainly didn't look like he was. In fact he was smirking at her sure he had gotten her there. Would he really bribe the Wizengamot to rule in his favour? Would the Wizengamot take bribes? Surely not. That wasn't their style. It was illegal to do so. Their sole purpose was to uphold the law. They wouldn't. Would they?

"Not the Wizengamot." She managed in a voice which was much stronger than she how she felt. "They wouldn't take bribes."

He smirked at her. "Well, we'll see won't we?"

"Why do you want the baby?" She asked. She was, admittedly, a little curious. Besides the obvious – he wanted an heir – why would he want a child? And why specifically would he want a child that was half her?

"An heir." He said coolly.

She sighed. She'd known that would be his first answer. She tried again, "Besides that, why do you want to raise the child?" Not that he would actually raise their child. He would hire someone to do it or at least his harpy of a mother would.

"I want to bring it up right." He snapped.

"You mean you want it to be like you? You want it to hate me. You want it to hate its' grandparents and hate Muggles."

"Not hate." He said slowly. "Just to have an aversion to Muggles."

"Why?" She demanded.

"Because it needs to fit in with the others, this child will grow up in a world where blood is everything. It's already half-blood because of you. Don't you get it? It's already going to be an outcast and looked down on. Can you imagine what will happen if it doesn't think like everyone else?"

She was startled for a moment by his intensity. He genuinely believed in what he was saying. In his own way he was doing this for the child because he wanted it to fit in and to belong. It was the wrong beliefs and the wrong world he wanted this child to have and to belong in but the sentiment was kind of there.

It wasn't really about blood, not really. She knew that Blaise himself did believe in blood superiority. He'd been brought up to believe that his lineage automatically made him a better person than everyone else. However, it seemed as if he didn't care so much about influencing his child to believe such things. Blaise, it was true, had not been part of the war. He hadn't fought for the right side but...well, he hadn't sided with Voldemort either. Maybe he wasn't as bothered about blood status as he pretended to be.

"Then don't make it try and fit in in a world where it never will." She said quietly. "They'll never accept this child. Not really. With me it can be happy."

He nodded once. "Yes. But I can't let that happen." He sounded sincere. This was a new Blaise she was seeing here or perhaps a well hidden side of him.

"Why not?" She yelled throwing her hands in the air in frustration.

"They won't like it. I have to fit in as well." His eyes were pleading with her to understand and accept what he was saying.

"Please." She said. Her eyes fluttered shut, trying to hold in tears. "This is my baby and I have to keep it, I want to keep him, my baby. There is no way I'll be able to hand it over. Let me keep him, let me raise him. You can have weekend visits but, please, just give up and let me keep him. I don't want this to end up in a courtroom and we both know it'll look bad if you go to the law for this. This is my baby."

It was true. Every single word of it was true. She did want to keep her baby. She had been fooling herself by even thinking she would be able to give him up. She knew, as she had all along, that the second he was born she would want him; the moment she looked in his eyes or held him in her arms was the moment she would never be able to turn back. How could she even have pretended like she could have given him up? How could she even think such things?

This baby was hers. Yes, it was his as well. But it was hers. Along the way she had forgotten that crucial point - the baby was hers as well. She could ensure that he was a good person, someone she could be proud of, an upstanding citizen, someone who would go on to do good. He would be brought up with a loving mother. He would have a family in the Weasleys. He would grow up surrounded by love and happiness, family and friends.

He would be able to see his father and his paternal family at weekends. Of course he would love them too and that would be hard for her to accept but she didn't think anyone could prefer the cold embrace of the Zabinis to the loving warmth of the Weasley family. The child would love them best. Of course he would.

And of course, Blaise and his mother would attempt to corrupt him. They'd try and poison him with their misguided and outdated beliefs but she would be able to save him and show him how wrong they were.

The child, her child, could be happy.

She opened her eyes finally. He was watching her. He wore an inscrutable expression that she couldn't get a read on. They regarded each other for a long moment. Blaise appeared to be searching for something.

So quickly she could have blinked and missed it, he nodded. In the next second, he'd left, the door loudly clattering shut behind him.

She managed a small smile as she sunk down onto a nearby desk. "Thank you." She whispered to the empty classroom. "Thank you."


	88. Ron and Padma 6

**A/N: For FlutePower and Fernsong. Apologies for the slow updates and relatively short chapter – I've had hardly any time to write recently.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Ron x Padma

The portrait hole swung open, hitting the wall with a solid thudding noise, half the room looked up to see Padma fly through, almost tripping over her own feet and the hem of her cloak in her haste to get through the wall and into the room.

Her eyes scanned the room quickly before settling upon him. He was sitting down near the window working rather diligently on his homework. Her expression relaxed somewhat upon seeing him – things would be okay. She almost ran over to him.

"Ihavesomethingtotellyou." She said excitedly in one breath, sitting down on the chair opposite him and leaning forwards on her chair.

Ron blinked once. Slowly, he set his quill down and pushed his half written Transfiguration essay away from him. "Start again." He said. "I didn't get a word of that."

She sighed exasperatedly as if he were being particularly slow on purpose or something. "I said that I have something really important to tell you so you have to come with me."

"Can't you just tell me here, I've got this essay to do for McGonagall, nine inches, and it's killing me. I've only got six." He moaned, sending a venomous glare in the direction of said homework.

"Nope." She said briskly, her enthusiasm unhampered by his negative attitude. "Come on!"

She took his hand and pulled him to his feet. He followed her rather reluctantly back through the portrait hole, along a few corridors and up three consecutive staircases before she stopped, evidently deciding that they were now far away enough from any eavesdroppers.

She turned to face him, beaming proudly. "I'm pregnant!"

He froze.

She waited for a moment. Her expression fell. "Don't...I thought..." She stopped.

He swore silently. He didn't deal well with surprises especially huge bombshell type ones like these. "I..." He trailed off, too shocked to find the right words for this situation. No one had ever briefed him on what to say in moments like this. It should be a lesson here, he thought, just for the guys, what-to-say-in-difficult-situations-so-that-you-don't-offend-anyone-particularly-your-now-very-hormonal-very-upset-pregnant-wife. Or something along those sort of lines anyway.

He caught a quick glance of her hurt expression and, much to his horror, a possible glimpse of tears before she sped past him and disappeared down a staircase.

He sat down on the floor, not really caring that this deserted corridor was really quite dusty and that at any time anyone could walk past.

He was not expecting something like this. Sure, they had talked about it and he had realised it would happen someday, someday soon. But now...Merlin.

He wasn't ready to be a dad. He could hardly take care of himself on a day to day basis let alone a young infant who was entirely dependent on him for everything. He wasn't ready. He couldn't do this.

He knew full well he'd never been particularly special. He'd been the third wheel of the Golden Trio, he'd always been very average at school, he'd been outshone by all of his siblings. This child, his child, was going to look up to him. What sort of role model was he going to be? How could this child be proud of him? He hadn't achieved anything, not really.

He couldn't even provide for a family – he hadn't even finished his schooling and education. He wasn't qualified to do anything; he hadn't even decided what he wanted to do yet. Where were they going to live? How were they going to find the money for a pram and clothes and a cot and all the other stuff a baby needed? What would they do?

He took a deep breath. His mum was a strong advocate of keeping a calm head in difficult situations, just breathe, she always said, things are never as bad as they seem.

Things weren't great though, he thought derisively, her advice obviously didn't apply in every situation. He couldn't be a dad.

He wasn't good enough. He wasn't old enough. He wasn't mature enough. He didn't have a job. He had hardly anything.

How could he raise a kid?

He'd have Padma, of course, and she'd be a good mum. But, he couldn't raise a child. The child would be severely let down on the paternal front. He would never be able to give them – his baby and his wife - everything they wanted. They wouldn't be Weasley poor, at least he hoped not, but they'd never have plenty.

He clambered to his feet using the wall for support, he wasn't quite sure whether he was going to be able to stand (after all, he'd had a shock). He wasn't quite sure what to do now. How could he go back to his Transfiguration essay now and try and write three more inches, knowing that he was going to be a father, that he was going to have to look after this baby and provide for it and ensure that it turned out to be a half decent human being.

Padma. His wife. His beautiful, loving wife.

He'd hurt her. Seriously hurt her. She'd been so thrilled and had expected him to be equally overjoyed, or at least to express some form of happiness. And he hadn't. He'd messed it all up.

She hadn't expected this either. When this baby was born, in fact even now whilst she was pregnant, things were going to be scarier and more difficult and more serious for her. She would have to actually carry their child for nine months before giving birth to him or her, she would need to mother it, care for it, love it. She would be perhaps in some ways more responsible for their child.

She would be a good mum. A really good mum. He just knew it. She believed in him. She had, although perhaps unwillingly at first, married him, she loved him and clearly trusted him to be the father of her children. Perhaps with her belief he could do this. After all, she was a very good judge of character, maybe she was right and he could do this.

He had to go and find her now. She was upset and he needed to comfort her and to apologise and to show her that he was ecstatic they were having a child.

It wouldn't be a lie. He was pleased to be having a baby, their baby. He was hoping for a girl, every bit as beautiful as her mother but hopefully with a definite little bit of Weasley in there as well, perhaps in the freckles or something. She, if it were a girl, would be beautiful and intelligent and bright and funny and lovely.

Their child, no matter what it was or what it was like, was still that – their child. It was their job, him and Padma's, to look after it and love it and raise it. It would be difficult and sometimes they might make mistakes but they would be together and together they could probably do it.

He summoned the Marauder's Map. It was still technically Harry's but he knew that his best friend wouldn't mind. Or, hopefully, he'd be able to put it back before Harry actually even found out.

He located his wife on the map, pausing just for a moment to marvel in the fact that she was labelled 'Padma Weasley' on it, it still made him smile when he heard her new name.

She was not far away in a little used classroom. She'd obviously taken shelter in the nearest empty space. He walked purposefully down the corridor, he had to make things right. He was going to make things right.

He entered quietly. She was sitting at a desk looking miserable, tears rolling down her cheeks. She hadn't noticed his entrance. Oh Merlin, he had done this...he had made her unhappy, had made her cry.

"Padma..."

She turned to glare at him fiercely. "What d'you want?"

"Well, I was thinking," he'd never been good with words. Harry was always better at this sort of thing or Hermione; Hermione would know exactly what to say. He had no clue and yet, he had to try. He had to make things right again. "I was thinking that I messed up and said the wrong thing...well, didn't say anything, and I think we should try it again."

She sniffed and wiped her face self consciously with the back of her hand. "You'll do it properly this time?"

He nodded.

She pursed her lips for a moment before she got to her feet and walked slowly towards him. "I have something to tell you."

He nodded once and took her hand, squeezing it once gently in his. "Okay, let's hear it."

She half smiled. He could still see traces of tears glistening in her eyelashes. He pushed her hair back out of her face with one hand.

"I'm pregnant." She said trying to be blasé but not quite managing it – a huge smile graced her face as she said the words.

He grinned. "Seriously? No way- I'm gonna be a Daddy! We're having a baby!" He hugged her tightly, picking her up right off of her feet and spinning her around until she (and he) was dizzy. He set her down carefully and kissed her tenderly on the forehead.

"Better?" He asked casually, still holding her to him.

"Much better."


	89. George and Luna 8

**A/N: For spring butterfly, Fernsong, MidnightIsCalling and the other hundred odd people who had requested them previously!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

George x Luna

"Are you sure?"

She'd been asked that question a lot recently.

Professor McGonagall had asked her with a suitably concerned expression and just a hint of disbelief. She'd given her a little lecture on the benefits of education and qualifications and the chances she was throwing away. It hadn't made one jot of difference. Luna was married to a man who had left school with just three basic qualifications and was incredibly successful despite this fact. She'd pointed this out to her headmistress (who had not been particularly impressed, even though it was common knowledge she had really rather liked the Weasley twins) and, reluctantly, McGonagall had accepted her decision to leave Hogwarts.

Molly Weasley had taken her aside at one Weasley dinner. She'd been so worried about her. These days Molly had definitely taken on a mother role to Luna. Luna was honoured to be considered one of the family, she was one of them now and thrilled to be such, and yet when Molly pleaded with her to reconsider, she told her no and that she knew this was the right decision for her. She'd been quite shocked at her own daring and worried that Molly wouldn't like her anymore. She'd been so long without a mother that she hadn't reckoned on a mother's love. Molly had hugged her fiercely and told her she would love her no matter what and that she respected her for standing up to her.

Harry had asked her several times if she knew what she was doing, as had Hermione and even Padma. Hermione had been hardest to shake off. Hermione loved school, she idolised education. She had been almost scandalised that Luna wanted to leave. Luna felt bad – Hermione belonged here, she was such an intelligent person who flourished in a school environment, and yet she would have a baby and she would waste the years she had devoted to education and furthering her knowledge because she would have to raise her child and here she, Luna, was throwing it all away when poor Hermione would never get the chance.

Hermione was the real casualty of this law, her brains and her intelligence and her drive to work would be lost, she would have been an asset to any company she worked for. She would never have that opportunity, not whilst she was young and who knew what would or could happen to her knowledge and skills over the next twenty odd years.

And, of course, George had asked her the same question over and over. He felt terribly guilty that she was giving this up for him. He had begged her to reconsider. She knew that Molly Weasley had been very unhappy with him for letting her give up school. She had explained that it wasn't entirely for him; after all she was doing it for her as well and for the baby. She was doing it for them, for their family.

She'd left Hogwarts quite happily two days ago. She'd had one day at home with her father, saying goodbye to her childhood home and all the places she had loved nearby. Today, her second day, was moving day.

She was ready to move to her new home. She had said goodbye to her old life – Hogwarts and her childhood home.

Her last day at Hogwarts had been hard. She hadn't really realised how many friends she had made until she left prematurely. They had flocked around her – Harry, Hermione, Ron, Padma, Ginny, Dennis Creevey, Hagrid, Michael Corner and the rest – to say goodbye and good luck, to give her hugs and cuddles and to make her promise to write.

She would see them all again. Half of them were actually family now. She wasn't leaving them not really. She was just moving away to start the rest of her life; they would be part of it just in a different way now. She hadn't minded leaving school much. Her parents had never been big supporters of the education system; her father had only let her go because Dumbledore had visited the house and talked with him for several hours, discussing the subject. Dumbledore had evidently managed to persuade him because they had emerged from their talks and she had been told she was going to Hogwarts. She hadn't even wanted to go originally. Her father had made her promise to stay one term and then he had promised that if after that she still wanted to leave then she could. At the end of the first term, she had seriously considered leaving but had eventually decided against it. She had stayed only because she thought she should. Of course after a few years she had made friends and hadn't minded school much.

However, she'd never thought of it as home as some people had. She'd never fallen in love with the castle. She'd never really enjoyed lessons and loved learning. People like Harry and Hermione had found a home here, it was the first place they had fitted in and belonged, it was the first place they had found family and friends, it was the first place they had discovered who they truly where.

Luna, however, had always known she was a witch, she knew of her heritage and her abilities. She didn't need Transfiguration lessons to tell her that. She'd belonged at home, where she had family who were also for the most part friends to her as well. She hadn't needed to be sorted into a house to find family members. She had found some, in the end, but she hadn't directly needed to go to school to find her place.

Her place had never been at the castle. Her place was with George. She knew that now.

It was time to leave the castle behind. She would never regret her decision to leave. It would have been nice to stay and to spend some time just being a student. But, she could never regret the decision that allowed her to spend more time with George, before the baby came. It wasn't that she didn't want the baby because she really did, they both did, she just wanted to spend a few months with her husband just being them. They would never ever get that chance again, not after their baby was born. It was now or never.

She'd chosen now and couldn't care less about the sacrifices she'd had to make or the consequences of her decisions. She was thrilled to have some time to spend with him. So was he. He'd been guilty at first but it was subsiding slowly and excitement was slowly taking over. No matter what he said or whichever arguments he came up with, he couldn't hide the fact that he was just as excited as she was about them living together.

She was going to live with him in the flat above the shop. At first the twins had shared it. However, Fred had bought his own place with Angelina. Angie had always been a little wary of the flat with good reason - it contained many half finished experiments or products which were half way through testing. It was quite usual to pick a seemingly normal object up and have it explode or turn you blue.

You also had to be incredibly careful what you ate – the twins often hid products in cupboards in the hopes of finding an unwilling test subject. They preferred to test their inventions on other people. They also tested them on each other, usually without the other's permission. Sometimes, however, they hid a product and then promptly forgot about it, until of course it exploded or covered someone in green goo or rendered them incapable of speaking in any language other than Greek for three hours (the latter having been experienced by an unsuspecting Angelina one particularly memorable Saturday afternoon).

The flat was...dangerous, and yet really quite exciting. Angelina hadn't wanted to live there any longer; she hadn't really liked the risk. She'd expressed her distaste a few times and so Fred had bought them a tiny place. He'd just about been able to afford it – Angelina wasn't working so there was no second salary to help out.

George had kept the flat. It was part of a deal they had made. Luna wasn't exactly sure of the terms but she knew George helped Fred out with funding the buying of the flat.

She stood in the living room of the flat, just taking in her surroundings. She had brought six boxes of stuff with her. George had shrunk them and put the six, now tiny, boxes into his shirt pocket before Apparating them here. He'd put them back to their normal size and left them in the centre of the flat. He'd had to go back to work as the shop was short staffed without him. He'd said she could put her belongings wherever she wanted and that he was just downstairs if she needed him.

She took in the flat. It was small and homely and cluttered, just the way she liked things. There were only a few rooms. There was the living room which was sparsely furnished and had the tiny kitchen crammed into one corner. There was no kitchen table as there wasn't room. The twins had instead invested in lap trays to eat their meals from. As she thought about each room and the changes she would make to them, she wandered through each taking in her new home. Three doors led off of this main room – two bedrooms and a bathroom. The bathroom was surprisingly large for such a small flat. It had ample space for a bath tub and separate shower. The two bedrooms were exactly equal in size. They were also laid out in exactly the same manner (although both twins swore blind this had been done by accident with no conferring between the two) with the bed against one wall, the wardrobe in the corner and a chair in the opposite corner.

One of the rooms would need to be redecorated for the baby. It was a decent enough size but they needed a crib and a changing table and she quite fancied a rocking chair. She wanted to paint the walls as well. George had laughed when she said that, he was a big believer in magical D.I.Y. Most wizards or witches were. She wasn't most though.

She didn't want to use a wand and have the job done in a few seconds though. She wanted to paint a room for her baby by herself the good old fashioned, back breaking, Muggle way. She'd always rather liked painting. When she was younger, she'd often done smaller paintings for her own enjoyment. However, her real passion had always been for bigger, larger canvases she could really make her mark on. A whole room was the biggest canvas you could get.

She wandered back through the potential nursery into the living room again, sat down on the single couch and smiled contentedly to herself. This was her home now. She didn't care that it was tiny or cramped or cluttered, it was still her home. This was where she would live for the next few years, where she would raise her children, where she would live with her husband, the love of her life, her George.

This was home.


	90. Draco and Katie 9

**A/N: For Rueflowersmall and delicate, thedevilandgod and Pilks. A huge thank you to all my lovely reviewers, you really do make my day, please do keep requesting!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Draco x Katie

She opened her door cautiously, trying to be as quiet as possible, and peered around the edge.

"Morning, my love. How are you?"

She cursed under her breath. How did he do that? Every single morning she tried her very best to avoid seeing him and every single morning he seemed to be passing by her door the very second she opened it. She'd tried everything – getting up early, having a lie in, creeping silently. Everything. He always managed to intercept her.

He was wearing that smug grin which she had found very rarely left his face.

"Great. I'm just great." She said through gritted teeth, trying to avoid actually looking at him. She didn't like mornings, she was the exact opposite of a morning person in fact, and she had found that looking at his smirking, smug, arrogant face before breakfast generally made her more irritable.

"Fantastic. Let's go down to breakfast." He swept his arm before her indicating her to continue.

She sighed and realised that there was no way she could get out of this. "Okay."

He smiled widely. She didn't actually look at him; she just knew that was what he was doing. He always was. He was pretty predictable.

He went to take her arm. She froze and turned her head very slowly to glare at the offending hand, outstretched towards her. Draco's grin only widened and he dropped his hand to his side. Her constant rejections and rebuffs only seemed to spur him on. He probably thought she was playing hard to get or something ridiculous like that.

"No matter, love, one day you'll beg me to touch you."

She shuddered. "Never. I'd die first." This wasn't strictly true, death would probably be a step too far, maybe being Crucio-ed repeatedly or something.

"Nonsense, you're well on your way there. You remember the night after the ball..." He trailed off, accompanying his words with a lecherous wink which made her stomach turn. "I notice you've been avoiding me since then."

"As opposed to before when I actively sought out your company?" She said scathingly. She had spent much of her life avoiding the prat, she was not about to stop now.

"Touché." He said, smiling happily. "Let's not argue darling, let us eat!" He leaped in front of her to open the door in a chivalrous fashion. She stalked through, ignoring him entirely.

The dining table was set for two. It looked a little out of place – this great long table with space for about twenty people, set just with two places right up one end.

"Mother is out today." He announced. "It's just us." He sounded thrilled, she was anything but.

"Shouldn't you be at work?" She asked in a slightly sulky fashion.

Draco loved work. While his father was in Azkaban, Draco had taken over the running of the family businesses. She hadn't realised quite how wealthy the Malfoys were or how exactly they got their money. It turned out they had a good share in pretty much every magical industry.

Some distant Malfoy ancestor had built it up, from scratch, and successive generations had simply maintained it. There had been very little expansion since that point. Clearly all descendant Malfoys had not inherited the flair for business.

Draco, as acting head of the family, was also acting head of their empire. He flourished off of the power. Katie didn't really see exactly what he did. He would never deign to actually work within the business. He seemed to rely on a network of very skilled managers to were clearly used to taking charge without actually seeming to do so (so as not to stand on any Malfoy toes). He had a lot of meetings though, usually in the form of business lunches, and usually with old Slytherin cronies like Blaise Zabini (who quite regularly dropped in and seemed to spend much of his time ogling her and making thinly veiled flirtatious remarks – disgusting).

"Nope, I've postponed my meeting until the afternoon. I shan't be back for dinner though."

"So I'll be alone for dinner?" Fingers crossed, she thought savagely. She really needed a night to herself. She could get the house elves to bring her dinner in her room; she could go to bed early and eat with her fingers. Or she could even go out and see the Weasleys and Angie or something.

"No, Mother will be home by then." Draco said, crushing her half raised hopes in just a few words.

"Oh." She couldn't quite manage to hide her distaste. Draco pretended not to have noticed. He seemed to have a real affection for his mother, Merlin only knew why.

Draco pulled a chair out for her. She sat down in it without acknowledging him. He seated himself beside her. He always sat at the head of the table and she would have to sit lower down, something which really irked her. Why was she automatically subordinate because she was female?

He clicked his fingers and a house elf appeared. Katie decided it was female – you could never be quite sure with house elves. She couldn't keep track of them all – the Malfoys seemed to have a whole army of them.

The house elf bowed low to first Draco and then her. Katie half smiled at it when it bowed, it seemed actually shocked.

It carefully began to serve them breakfast. Somehow the house elves knew exactly which food to offer each guest, particularly with family members. Another house elf appeared clutching a copy of today's Daily Prophet. Draco took it and unfolded it leisurely, tucking into a bowl of fresh fruit as he perused the newspaper. She took a slice of toast, the first house elf produced a dish of butter and held it for her. She blinked in surprise but accepted the butter.

She bit into her breakfast slowly. No matter how much she despised this place, she couldn't deny that the food here was amazing.

"Enjoying that my darling?" Draco drawled, ruining her moment entirely.

"Will you please stop with the pet names?" She said irritably. "If you must talk to me, just call me Katie."

"Okay, Katie sweetheart."

She half growled in response which only made his grin stretch even wider.

"Something wrong, blossom?"

"No, nothing is wrong, honey." She emphasized the last word, deciding to play him at his own game.

"Honey?" He looked faintly insulted and she smiled happily.

"Yes, sweetheart. Don't you like being called honey?"

"No."

"What about honey bear?"

He looked actually offended. She couldn't help but laugh at his expression. Draco was clearly used to getting his way, the girls he had dated before had probably been perfect Purebloods brought up to be wives and mothers without a single original thought in their pretty little airheads. He obviously wasn't prepared for a girl to tease him, to mock him, to be sarcastic.

He just harrumphed loudly, obviously being unable to find any halfway decent retort, and brought his paper up to cover his face. Her mouth twitched in amusement. True to type whenever Draco felt humiliated or bettered he reverted to child like behaviour.

She couldn't deny that however irritating he was (and he really really was an incredibly annoying person), he was certainly rather amusing at times, if usually inadvertently.

She glanced at him from the corner of her eye, biting into her buttery toast as she did so. He had lowered the newspaper a little and she could see the top of his head and his arms. She noticed he was wearing a Muggle work shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. He usually wore Muggle clothing, his whole family did. She always found it odd that the Malfoys, along with many other Pureblood families, wore Muggle clothing whilst professing to hate Muggles. Maybe they didn't realise the clothes were Muggle or something.

He caught her eye curiously and she looked away quickly, realising she had been staring. She could tell he was smirking but concentrated very hard on her almost finished breakfast instead.

"Isn't this nice love?" Draco said happily, breaking the (welcome) silence.

"What is?" She said sharply.

"Breakfast. Like this...you know, like a married couple."

She wrinkled her nose in distaste at the very idea. Yes, they were a married couple and yes, they were eating breakfast together in a sort of contented silence, but still...they weren't like that. They'd never be that sort of married couple, she simply wouldn't allow it.

He laughed at her expression. "You don't seem keen on the idea, Kate."

"Katie." She corrected automatically. "And you know I'm not."

"I don't see why not. This marriage is good for both of us."

She snorted dismissively in a fashion that would have made Narcissa faint in horror. "Marriage isn't about making an advantageous match, whatever you've been told. It's about love, clearly something neither of us have for the other."

Draco thought for a moment. He wasn't sure how to answer this. Ideally, he needed to say something about how they could grow to love each other, something that she would lap right up and make her warm to him further. That would probably be classed as lying though. He had sworn to make Katie his right from that very first Ministry meeting back in September. Technically, she was his now, she had his name and lived in his house and shared his bed. But he wanted her for real, he wanted her to want him back. Love? Love had nothing to do with it. That one drunken night after the ball had been a small victory but it wasn't enough, he wanted her fully and completely.

"You're right." He said finally before changing the subject suddenly. "Are you done?" He gestured at her empty plate, littered with toast crumbs.

She nodded and he clicked his fingers at the nearest house elf who immediately began clearing dishes. He got to his feet loudly and threw his newspaper onto the table. He brushed a few nonexistent crumbs from his shirt. She found herself, quite bizarrely and definitely rather uncharacteristically, watching the movements of his hands, a little mesmerized by the slow movements. She even had a rogue, traitorous thought about his muscles, which were defined beneath his shirt. She pushed that thought away, crushing the tiny thought instantly. He was good looking, yes, but he was still Draco Malfoy – son of a Death Eater, arrogant and prejudiced. She looked away very quickly before he could notice her glances. She couldn't be caught staring again.

"I have to go now, love."

"'Kay." She said absent mindedly, already pulling the newspaper towards her to distract herself.

He turned to leave, turning back when he reached the doorway to catch one last glimpse of his wife. What he had not been expecting was for her to also be looking. Their eyes met for one brief second before she dropped her gaze, cheeks flushing. He grinned in a shark like fashion as he exited the house.

Katie waited until she heard the door slam shut before she groaned loudly and led her head drop onto the thankfully empty table.

What in Merlin's name had just happened?


	91. Neville and Hannah 6

**A/N: For spring butterfly, MidnightIsCalling, FlutePower and Whisperheart. **

**I love this couple and you have no idea how much I want them to be happy, but right now they aren't. I promise things will get better for them soon.**

**I know it's short but I'm technically supposed to be studying for my history exam tomorrow. If I fail, I'm blaming fan fiction. **

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. Or that One Tree Hill quote...which, by the way, I love, almost as much as I love One Tree Hill...and One Tree Hill's Nathan ;)**

Neville x Hannah  
_  
The hardest part of saying goodbye is having to do it again every single day.  
- Lucas Scott, One Tree Hill_

Goodbye's. Life is full of them. They are honestly one of the hardest things you'll ever have to do. I'm not talking about those brief goodbye's you utter to your nearest and dearest safe in the knowledge that you'll see them again in an hour or a day or a week or even a year. You know that the parting is only temporary and that before long you will be reunited. The goodbye is just a temporary measure, something used to close a conversation or to end a meeting. Nothing serious.

The goodbyes I refer to are permanent separations.

I said goodbye to my own mother just over a year ago.

For Neville, I supposed his grandmother was like his mother. And his father. And all four grandparents. And his brother. And his sister.

She was everything. It was hard, terribly awfully dreadfully hard, to say goodbye to my mum. I cannot comprehend how hard it must be to say goodbye to one person who was so much to him.

I have no idea how to make him feel better or if, indeed, he will ever feel better.

'_He needs some help and you're the only one that can help.' _

Augusta had faith in me. I wonder sometimes if her faith was mistaken. I don't think I'm the one Neville needs right now. He needs her.

She had an abrupt way of dealing with things. She would have strode in, brandishing her handbag like a weapon, and ordered him to snap out of it and have a shower (she always did have a way with words). He would have nodded dutifully and done as requested.

I'm not like her. I can't be her. I'm just not her.

I love Neville so very much. He needs help. He's drowning, drowning in sorrow and sadness and grief, and I can't keep him afloat.

I've always depended on him. He is, was, eternally dependable. During the war, he was a comfort to so many with his quiet sympathy and constant encouragement to keep going. He was our leader, the one we could always rely on, the one that never appeared to be scared or nervous or ever displayed anything other than bravery and optimism. In our relationship, he's always been the pillar of strength, the one to comfort me in times of unhappiness, the one I can turn to whenever I need help. Now, now he is a shadow of that man.

He's quiet and withdrawn, he shows no interest in the outside world or really in anything at all. He eats little, speaks less, moves hardly at all. He just sits, day in, day out. He stares vacantly, his eyes blank, at the wall, at the window, at the furniture, at whatever is there. He moves chairs occasionally. He won't sit in the sunlight. He follows the shadows around our home, from room to room, from chair to chair, finally retiring to bed when it grows late. He'll speak if you ask him a direct question but he never volunteers anything. He doesn't smile. Ever.

He's just gone.

He is still here as a physical presence but he isn't my Neville. It's haunting how like them he is now, like Alice and Frank. He's like someone else entirely, someone who has seen too much pain. Of course, Neville has seen and experienced too much, much too much. But he's always been able to keep his head high and keep smiling throughout it all.

I think this was the final blow. He's sinking now. The amount of pain he's feeling and the way he's acting isn't healthy or natural. He's not just grieving for Augusta. He's grieving for Frank and poor Alice. He's grieving for those lost in the war. I think he's grieving for what could have been and the life he could have had, the life he should have had.

I don't know how to be the lifebelt. I don't know if I'm strong enough. I've tried to be the person he needs but it's not me. I'm not a strong or forceful person, I never have been and I don't know how to be that person.

I have no idea what to do anymore.

Augusta had faith that I would be able to do this and I've let her down horribly. She asked me to look after him, she believed that I would be able to do it. I have to try again for her sake at least.

"Neville?" I say quietly.

He turns his head to look at me. For a split second, there's nothing there. Nothing at all. It's like he doesn't know me, he just looks right past. Then his eyes seem to refocus and there is a spark of acknowledgement. He looks tired, I note. He doesn't seem to sleep at night; he just lies there and stares.

"You need to get up." I say firmly, channelling my inner Augusta for a moment (a part of me I didn't even know I possessed).

He shakes his head once and goes to turn away from me, to go back to his endless staring.

"C'mon Neville. You need to have a shower, come on." I persist ruthlessly.

A tiny crease appears between his eyebrows. I almost want to laugh, it's rather comical to see. He wasn't expecting this. I've let him be for over a week now and in that time I haven't intervened or interfered. It's time to start getting back now. Just a tiny step at a time.

"I don't want to." He says finally. His voice cracks from lack of use.

I shrug. "Doesn't matter. You need to."

"I don't want to." He repeats stubbornly like a little kid.

I kneel down, placing my hands on his knees. He leans his head down to meet my eyes.

"I know things are awful right now but it's been over a week, Neville. You can't go on like this forever; I can't go on like this forever. I get that it's still hurting, it'll probably always hurt, but you need to get up. She wouldn't want you to be like this, would she?" He shakes his head slowly. "I don't expect you to be laughing and cracking jokes and whistling...but...well you need to live, Nev. She doesn't get to live anymore, she'd want you to make the most of your time."

"It's not fair." He says pathetically. He looks lost and frightened, not at all like an adult man. He looks like a child.

"It's not." I agree.

His face crumples suddenly and he sobs brokenly. I tuck myself securely into his lap and he clutches me like a drowning man clings to a rock. He sobbed for a long while, tears running down his face, soaking through my shirt and his. I let tears of my own join them – for Augusta and for him. I held him and muttered inaudible nothings – I doubt he even registered that I was speaking or even heard what I was saying. It didn't matter though, I was there and I hoped that was enough.

"Thanks." He muttered when the tears had finally subsided enough for him to speak.

I could tell he was embarrassed – he didn't like to break down in front of people – so I just nodded, half smiled and got up. He disappeared in the direction of the bathroom.

I think it might have worked, for now at least. It wasn't going to be easy. I understood that it would be weeks, probably months, before things were normal. As normal as they could get anyway. I knew from experience that the hurt was still there even a year later and I strongly suspected the sense of loss would always be there. It was hard just getting up every morning and having to face the fact that they, whomever you had lost, weren't going to be there.

I had found that the cruellest part was not remembering they were gone, it happened a lot particularly at the beginning, and having it hit home once again that your loved one was gone, forever. Neville would need my help to get through this and although I felt as if I was entirely out of my depth, I would just have to try my best and hope it was enough.


	92. Harry and Ginny 8

**A/N: For MidnightIsCalling, lovenotwarXo, Mae Bright and Jojii-chan.  
**

**This probably goes back in time a little bit since the previous few chapters. Each couple has a different story meaning that sometimes they intertwine and align chronologically and sometimes they don't. This chapter is in the latter category. **

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Harry x Ginny

Three days.

It had been three whole days since the story had hit headlines across the country.

Percy had kept them informed as frequently as was possible. He couldn't always get away from work and he had to be secretive as he couldn't let anyone know that he was informing the couple of every development. Besides, he wasn't even able to be present for all of the decisions made.

Apparently, the Ministry's initial plan was to act as if nothing had happened and that they had no knowledge of the story. This had had to be changed when the tidal wave of angry letters and Howlers and cursed mail continued relentlessly. Percy reckoned that there was, if possible, more letters by the second day.

The Ministry had to take action. They had to do something.

Harry sat down on the bench opposite his wife. They exchanged a smile laced with longing. Both desperately wanted to kiss the other good morning or exchange a comforting hug. It was impossible and foolish to do so. A smile was all they could have.

Harry grabbed a piece of toast from the rack and buttered it slightly irritably. He was sick of this, sick of it all.

A rising noise which sounded a lot like a strong wind could suddenly be heard. Both Ginny and Harry immediately stopped eating, letting their food drop to their plates and turning their faces expectantly to the ceiling. A mass of owls flew in, a blur of grey and brown and black, swooping down to various students and depositing letters and parcels and packages. Some stayed for a few moments, others left instantly.

A glossy grey owl flew low over Harry's head and dropped a letter in his lap. Harry seized it. It had the official Ministry seal. This was it – it had to be.

He ripped it open impatiently, almost tearing the paper in half in his impatience.

'_To Mr Potter,_

_You and your wife are required to attend an official Ministry meeting with the Minister of Magic today at four o'clock._

_Yours sincerely,  
Percy Ignatius Weasley  
(on behalf of the Minister of Magic, Kingsley Shacklebolt)'_

Harry froze.

Ginny ripped it impatiently from his hands, taking care not to actually touch him and scanned it eagerly.

"Is this?" She said dazed. Harry nodded dumbly. They both smiled at each other.

"Have they cracked?" Ron appeared behind them, holding Padma's hand. He slid into the seat beside Harry, pulling Padma with him.

"Not sure." Harry said, reading through the letter again. "But we're got a meeting with Shacklebolt today."

"This has to be it!" Ron said excitedly. "Maybe Kingsley wants to give you the good news in person."

"Harry and Ginny Potter, here for a meeting with the Minister of Magic." Harry said clearly into the telephone receiver.

Two badges appeared emblazoned with their respective names and the words 'Ministerial Meeting'. Both pinned them hastily to the front of their robes as the telephone box slid underground.

The Ministry was teeming with workers most of whom didn't even look up when they appeared in the lobby. The pair approached the official check-in desk.

A witch, who barely glanced at them, wrote down their names and checked their wands in a half hearted fashion.

"Top floor." She said. "The lift is just along there." She gestured vaguely to her right with a jerk of her head before turning away, clearly dismissing the couple.

The lift was also full. A very small wizard was standing in the back corner half hidden behind a massive stack of cauldrons, at the second floor everyone had to awkwardly shuffle to the sides as he clambered out. At the third floor a few inter departmental memos flew in, they flew idly around the light, casting random shadows over the remaining people within the lift.

A wizard with violently purple hair turned to them. "You're Harry Potter, aren't you?"

"Yeah." Harry said honestly.

"I hope they give in..." The wizard said with a faintly embarrassed blush. "You two deserve to be together." He hurried out at the next floor without a backward glance.

Harry and Ginny exchanged half smiles – at least some of the Ministry workers were on their side. They needed any hint of support they could get. Ron, at least, was confident Kingsley would remove the charms and let them be together properly. They weren't so sure. The Ministry hadn't been their friend so far, why would anything change now? Neither wanted to get their hopes up only to have them crushed brutally if it didn't go their way.

They were the only two left in the lift when it finally reached the top floor. Harry stepped out first and Ginny followed him automatically falling into step beside him. Both desperately wanted to hold hands but it wasn't worth the pain to have a second of reassurance.

Percy was sitting at his desk, almost directly in front of a door labelled 'Minister of Magic'.

"Harry, Ginny!" He greeted them cheerfully, getting up from his desk to hug Ginny and pat Harry on the back manfully. "How are you?"

"Good, we're good. D'you know what's going on?" Harry asked.

Percy shook his head and said rather regretfully. "Sorry, haven't got a clue."

He knocked on the door and opened it. "Mr and Mrs Potter to see you."

'Good luck,' he mouthed as they passed him in single file.

Kingsley's office was spacious with huge windows. He sat behind a fairly cluttered desk.

"Harry, Ginny. Please sit." Kingsley said in his slow voice.

Both sat.

"I'm sure you will have some idea about why you are both here today." Kingsley began.

"Yeah." Harry said a little abruptly.

"So let us get straight to the point. Let's not tiptoe around the issue. You two broke the law, humiliated the Ministry and then went public making us look like the bad guys and turning the Ministry into a hate figure."

"You ruined the lives of thousands of young war heroes who had done nothing but fight for our freedom, for your freedom, tore Harry and I apart even though everyone knew we were together, tried to force us into marrying other people, like you did to thousands of other people, sent trained Aurors to find us and then made it impossible for us to be together." Ginny said defiantly.

"That's true. Unfortunately, I had to act as expected. Did I admire your courage in leaving? Did I deliberately send the worst and least experienced Aurors out after you? Did I have my fingers crossed for you? Yes, yes and yes. As your friend, perhaps former friend as I'm sure you two will consider me, I wanted you two to be together. I even tried to persuade people that you two should be assigned, unfortunately you two were not matched initially and you hadn't been together long enough to qualify."

Harry was a little apprehensive. Kingsley sounded genuine, his eyes seemed to be telling the truth, and yet Harry had been so misused by the Ministry so many times that it was just instinctive to not trust him.

"As the Minister, I had to act. If everyone had followed your example, the law would have been null and void. The law was necessary. It was, I promise, the only action I could take so I took it; do you think I wanted to be the most hated Minister of all time? Of course I didn't." He laughed once humourlessly, his laugh was tinged with bitterness. "I did it because I had to. Just as I had to do all of those things to you – sending out Aurors and having the contracts activated."

"It was you." The words burst furiously from Ginny before she could restrain them. She'd been holding desperately onto the idea that Kingsley hadn't ordered this, that he hadn't even really known about it. She'd wanted to believe that he was still a good person and that he was still their friend, the steady, trusted Auror they had once known. This had just been blown out of the water by his revelation and she was fuming. If she'd been able to get away with it, she would have Avada Kevrada'd him on the spot.

"Of course it was." Kingsley said quietly. "And I am sorry, truly sorry. It was the lowest thing I have ever done but please, if you will, try and see if from my view. I am the Minister of a depleted race, a race which has been weakened by this dreadful war. We desperately need more witches and wizards, more magical folk, without this law we would be extinct within decades. I had to put the law in place and I had to enforce it. If I didn't then everyone would rebel and we'd have achieved nothing. I had to do everything possible to try and split you up, even though I didn't want to, to show a hard line Ministry approach. I had to warn everyone else what would happen if they followed your example. Can you see that perhaps I did these things because I had to not because I wanted to?"

Ginny nodded once. "I understand." She did understand. Kingsley had been in a desperate situation and had acted as Minister of Magic, not as their friend. She understood why he had done it, even if she hated it.

"The public backlash, although making the Ministry a hate figure, has helped you two out. I can now release you two from the contracts and do what the public wants. And, of course, what I wanted to do all along." He managed a half smile before it died away.

He gestured to two inconspicuous pieces of paper lying on his desk. "Incendio." He muttered calmly, pointing his wand at the paper.

It burst into flames without warning. The three sat in silence, watching dumbly as the paper burned, curling into grey ash and slowly burning itself out.

"I think you will find that you two are now free to be together." Kingsley said quietly. He seemed calm and unruffled.

Harry turned to Ginny. In unison both tentatively reached one hand out to the other. Slowly, they moved together, the very tips of their fingers just touching.

Nothing happened.

Harry grinned hugely and pulled her to him, right up into his arms. He could feel her smile against his cheek, she pulled her head back to kiss him. Neither could stop smiling, things had turned out for the best, things were just right. They were free. Free to be together.

"Thank you." Harry said fervently, turning to Kingsley. He didn't let go of Ginny. He'd never willingly let her go again.

They'd been unfairly separated for too long, much too long. Maybe they were stronger for it, though, they'd established a relationship that was able to be affectionate and loving without requiring physical contact. They'd had more time to talk and to really get to know the other person. They'd been through a lot and maybe at the end of it all they were better, stronger, more in love people than they had been beforehand.

It was clear to both, however, that they'd never be able to withstand being separated for so long again. In fact, he never wanted to go a single day without seeing her, without being able to kiss her and to be with her, really be with her, without being able to reach out and touch her on impulse, without being able to do something as simple as hold her hand.

One thing was for sure though - they'd never be without each other again.


	93. Seamus and Parvati 5

**A/N: For spring butterfly. It's not the most requested, I just fancied writing this one.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. It belongs to Jo Rowling. Still.**

Seamus x Parvati

He climbed through the Portrait Hole, humming softly to himself. She was sitting almost directly in his eye line, he smiled at his wife's form. She sat in the Gryffindor Common Room deep in a sofa beside the fire, the flickering flames casting shadows on her features. A fat book was propped on the bulge of her stomach. Much to her dismay, she was larger than anyone else – even Hermione, even though Hermione was pregnant first. This was because she was carrying twins, he had assured her. He thought she was beautiful no matter what. In fact, he thought she was even more beautiful than usual when she was carrying his children.

He crossed the room and sat down beside her. She smiled up at him and reached up to kiss him.

"Andandita and Farha." She said decisively.

He frowned. "You hat?"

"For our girls." She cradled her stomach gently. Her face morphed into a loving smile. "Andandita and Farha, they mean happiness."

He still looked unsure.

"It's representative of us and of them." She explained patiently. "We're happy and we want to celebrate and acknowledge that fact. It's for them as well...a bit like a blessing. We want them to grow up and be happy and which names like that, which actually mean happiness, it gives them a bit of a headstart. Names can be very representative of people, you know."

"Farha's okay." Seamus said a little doubtfully. "Other one's a bit of a mouthful though. Me mam wants us to look at some Irish ones as well."

Parvati nodded. "I know. She owled me to tell me. Twice."

Seamus sighed. "Sorry about that love, you know what she's like." His mother was fiercely proud of her heritage and not afraid to put her own opinions forward at every opportunity.

Parvati nodded again. "I know, I didn't mind. I'd been looking at Irish names anyway though. I've got a list." She leaned forwards, reaching for her bag on the floor with a little difficulty and pulling it back up to her lap. "Merlin that's annoying. I'm so useless, I can't do anything! I want to be small again!" She wailed a tad melodramatically.

Seamus slipped an arm around her. "You're beautiful." He kissed her temple. She rolled her eyes. "I mean it; I think you're beautiful like this. Carrying my child. Mine, ours."

She smiled, pacified by his words, and rummaged through her bag, producing a sheet of paper covered in small handwriting.

"Woah...that's a lot of names." Seamus said a little shell shocked.

"Well yes," she said a little defensively. "I wanted to be prepared. We don't have all that long until they're due."

"Let's hear them then." Seamus smiled.

Parvati settled back into her seat. "Okay, well it depends where we want to go with the names. You're Irish and my family are Indian so we could go for traditional names."

"What one of each?" Seamus said jokingly.

"Exactly, isn't that a bit...weird? Like one child is my side of the family and the other belongs to you and your side. And also most of them sound silly together, the Irish name and the Indian one I mean."

"Why does that matter?"

"Because everyone will always say their names together. They are twins after all. People will refer to them as one... like me and Padma – Parvati and Padma. And like Fred and George Weasley. The names have to just fit together." She explained this in a tone which implied that it should be obvious.

"Well, what about if we didn't go with our heritage? What if we just went with something more...neutral? Something that we just like, not because it reflects where we're from." Seamus suggested mildly.

Parvati flipped the paper over noisily. "Okay, well I've narrowed it down to four in that category." Seamus nodded. "Sarah, Jessica, Nicole and Rebecca."

"My aunt is called Rebecca." Seamus said. "And I don't like Jessica."

"We could shorten it to Jess."

"I hate the name Jess, that's why we couldn't do Jessica." Seamus explained.

"Okay." Parvati crossed two of the names off. "Leaving Sarah and Nicole then. Well they're definite possibilities."

"What about Irish names then?"

Parvati ran her finger down the page, stopping at a short list about halfway down the page. "I've narrowed that down as well. Your mum sent me this huge book of Irish names. She'd even been through and crossed out all the ones of your family members and the ones she didn't like."

"Sorry." Seamus said ruefully. "She probably thought she was being helpful."

"No, she was. I didn't like anything she'd crossed out anyway."

"Well let's hear what you've got then." Seamus prompted.

"Okay, I like Caitlyn and Darcey. That would be a nice pair I think." She paused. "But I also like Teagan and Kelsey, but possibly not together. In fact, I can't really make Teagan go with anything. It just sounds wrong with anything."

"What about Briana? Teagan and Briana?"

"I don't like Briana though, it's a bit old fashioned."

"Okay, well Caitlyn is nice, that might be nice with Kelsey."

Parvati nodded. "I thought that."

"Irish though, through and through." Seamus said. "What about the Indian ones?"

"Anandita and Farha. I like Anita. My grandmother was called Sunetra and I always loved that name. I like Priya as well, it means beloved. I thought it was apt."

"Priya sounds good." Seamus said. "I don't really like any of the others."

"Well I've also thought about this. I think that Priya should be the name of our third child, assuming it's a girl. The twins will end up being a real unit, a two, and so the third child should have a name which reflects the fact that we love her just the same."

"You've already considered a third child?"

"Well yeah." She shrugged. "Three is the legal minimum."

He laughed and kissed her again. "I guess so. D'you only want three?"

She paused for thought. "Not sure. It'll depend. We'll have twins which will be really difficult, especially in the early years, and chances are we'll have our third child pretty soon afterwards. Maybe when they're older we could have a fourth. I mean we'd still be really quite young when they go off to Hogwarts."

He leaned his chin against the top of her head. "I know. We all will be. Our whole generation are, love."

There was a short pause. "Names." She said decisively. "We really do need to sort it."

"So we've narrowed it down to Caitlyn and Kelsey..."

"Yeah, and I still like Darcey-"

"Me too." He interjected.

"Caitlyn and Darcey?" She said thoughtfully. "Or Sarah and Nicole? Or do we just start all over?"

"We could mix them up. Like Darcey and Sarah. Or Nicole and Caitlyn."

Parvati paused. "We could." She said carefully.

Seamus recognised the tone. It meant no. The actual words might imply that the suggestion being made was a possibility but it wasn't. It meant no, no compromise, no possibility – just no.

"I prefer Caitlyn and Darcey." He said quickly.

She nodded and bit the tip of her quill. "Me too, I think."

"Is that it then?"

"Caitlyn, Darcey and Priya. Our three girls."

He slipped his arms around her pulling her even closer to him, kissing her forehead tenderly and sliding one hand on to her growing stomach. "Caitlyn, Darcey, Priya and Parvati. My four girls."


	94. Fred and Angelina 7

**A/N: For Rueflowersmall and delicate, spring butterfly, Lady Eleanor Boleyn and Nymphadora Potter.**

**I know it's been a little while, I just haven't been all that inspired lately. That aside, a huge thank you to everyone who has reviewed - your reviews make my day. Also, remember that this runs off of requests – please keep requesting your favourite couple!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Fred x Angelina

It had been two months.

Coincidentally, that was how long she had carried the baby before it had slipped away from this world.

Two long, agonising months.

It was easier now, to cope. The pain was still there but the shock had faded. It was just grief and sadness for what could have been that was left. They were moving on. It was time.

They had needed time to grieve properly, to mourn the loss of their unborn baby, their first baby. It was a natural process.

They couldn't grieve forever though.

The bad days had lessened both in number and intensity – she could get up every single morning and felt somewhat normal again most of the time.

She still felt the loss but not as keenly as before. Crucially, she didn't blame herself anymore. At first, she had been convinced it was her fault. Something she had done, or perhaps not done, had contributed to or caused this. She should have slowed down. She should have been more careful. She should have done things differently. She'd been convinced of this fact, even though everyone insisted it was not her fault. The Healers had told her time and time again that nothing she could have done would have prevented this tragedy occurring. It would have happened regardless of what she had or had not done.

It had been difficult to stop blaming herself. If it wasn't her fault, then who's was it? She'd never much gone in for religion or gods – it was just a way Muggles had found of explaining things they could never understand – but now she almost wanted to. If she believed, truly believed, then she would be able to blame them for the miscarriage.

She had eventually come to terms with the fact that it was no one's fault. Not hers. Not Fred's. Not the Healers or Mediwitches. Not anyone's. It had happened and it would have happened no matter what.

Fred was finding things easier as well. He got up every morning and even managed to smile and laugh nearly as much as he had done before. She knew that this was, in part, because of her, because she was getting better now and because she could smile and laugh and because he didn't have to worry anymore about her. It made her feel guilty that she'd made him that worried and concerned for her welfare. She hadn't realised how scared he had been.

Things were better.

The feelings were still there though. It was worse for her, she knew that, because she'd actually carried the baby. She couldn't help but imagine over and over what the baby would have been like – this little person, half her and half him.

She was bored as well, restless perhaps. She found herself aimlessly trailing around the flat, wondering what to do with herself. Before she found out she was expecting, she'd thought about finding a job. She'd been considering applying for a job at Gringotts. They had a lot of positions there for behind the scenes work, accounting and such. She'd always been good with numbers and had an O in Arithmancy. She'd never gotten around to applying though – she'd found out she was pregnant. Her plans had been put on hold. There was no way anyone would employ her when she would be leaving in a few months to have a baby. She wouldn't be able to work when her child was young either, she'd have to wait until he or she went to Hogwarts and even then, the likelihood was she'd have had one or two more therefore delaying her return to work.

Her arms ached for a child. It was ridiculous of course because she'd never actually held her child. Everywhere she went she saw babies – in prams, on laps, in arms. They were everywhere – in the street, in the shop, outside cafes. Perhaps they'd been there before and she'd never noticed them or perhaps it was the result of the new marriages, whatever it was there seemed to be babies everywhere.

Before the whole thing, she'd wanted a baby, craved a baby and the feelings were still there. She still longed for a baby. Her baby. His baby. Their baby.

By law, they had to have three. She'd only ever wanted two but three was the minimum – two to 'replace' their parents and an extra to boost the population. It was a grim thought. It was, however, the law.

She wanted a baby. She wanted a little person to love, to hold, to look after. She wanted some kind of purpose to her life. She wanted something (or rather, someone) to fill her days. She wanted, perhaps a little perversely, to replace the child she had lost. She wanted to make Fred happy again. She wanted to follow the law. She just wanted a baby.

"Angie, love?" Fred's head appeared around the doorway to their flat, soon followed by the rest of him. "You okay?"

Luckily, they lived above his workplace. This meant he could pop up whenever he fancied to check on her. Usually, he stopped by for lunch as well.

"Yeah. I'm fine. D'you want some lunch?" She glanced at the clock, realising she'd asked but had no idea what time it was.

He shook his head. "I'm good right now, thanks." This was probably because it was only eleven o'clock. Probably a bit early for lunch.

There was a short pause.

"I think it's time." She blurted out suddenly. She hadn't meant to say them, they seemed to have burst out of her.

He blinked. "Really? You think so? He seemed to understand exactly what she was saying even without her really explaining.

She nodded. "Don't you?" She bit her lip, worried.

What if she'd hopelessly misjudged it and he didn't want a baby yet? What if he thought it was too soon? Was it too soon?

He stepped forwards and wrapped his arms around her, drawing her close to him. He spoke and acted to reassure. "Of course, love. Of course. I just thought you weren't ready yet." He dropped his chin to rest on the top of her head.

"I am." She said determinedly. "I can't mourn forever. Our first baby has gone and that's awful and sad and cruel but I think I've accepted that he or she has gone and that there was nothing, absolutely nothing, we could have done to prevent it. We need to move on with the rest of our lives and put it behind us. We won't forget about our first baby but we can't spend our whole lives remembering either."

He nodded. "You're right."

"Usually am." She winked teasingly.

He kissed the tip of her nose. "I think you're right, it is time. Let's have another baby."


	95. Blaise and Hermione 11

**A/N: For urquinaona, ChuddleyCanons, Malory14, Lady Eleanor Boleyn, Afrenchgirl, cullen's pet, forever12 and Cherelle Potter7. This is also for IceChanter who requested... babies! Oh yes, my darlings, I think it's time we got some babies in this here story... **

**As a point, I have never given birth so sorry if I've got it hopelessly wrong! **

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Blaise x Hermione

The Common Room was fairly quiet – the younger students were in lessons, leaving just some of the Seventh Years who had a free period to fill up the space. The Golden Trio, with the addition of Ginny (who never left Harry's side these days) and Padma (who was simply always there), were sitting across two sofas. Hermione had a book in her lap. She'd borrowed it from Parvati, it was a book of baby names.

She'd realised that she was hopelessly unorganised and underprepared to have this baby. She had been to see Professor McGonagall who had promised her that when she had her baby (she had always known her son would be born before the final exams) she could have her work owled to her every morning and that she could come in occasionally for study sessions and then for final exams. She was determined that having a baby would not ruin her chances at a good career. Of course she wouldn't be able to work full time, perhaps not even part time, while her baby (and two subsequent babies) were young, but when they were older and at Hogwarts for most of the year she would be able to go out and work properly.

The meeting with McGonagall had been difficult, particularly for Hermione. She desperately did not want to leave school early. It was cruelly unfair. She would have to leave. No one else would have their babies before final exams, even Luna, who had fallen pregnant just after her, was not expecting her baby until a few weeks after school ended. It was a hopelessly outdated situation – Blaise would not leave school. He could stay here, content in his life, playing a miniscule role in his son's life. He would be able to have a life, a job, friends, freedom. It was unfair, cruel, unjust. And yet, the alternative was not even an alternative at all, not really. She could never let Blaise take care of her baby. Well, he wouldn't be the one actually caring for it of course, he would hand it over to his mother who would hand him over to a nanny. She would never let that happen to her son.

This was the only possible course of action.

After the meeting, she had realised she had no idea where she was going to live or what her son would be called. She didn't even own a crib. She had no idea how to be a mother, although she hoped it would come naturally to her. You couldn't exactly learn something like this out of a book. Being a good mother was about instinct and learning as you went along.

She was hoping that the Weasleys would take her in and let her live with them, until she could get her own place. She would have turned to her own parents but they weren't on the best terms at the moment.

They were hurt and a little angry that she had modified their memories and sent them away. They couldn't quite understand that she had done it for their own safety and protection. She'd gone and found them, just two weeks after the Final Battle, and given them their memories back. They'd all returned home. They'd been pleased to see her, happy to be themselves again, relieved that she was okay but there had been some tension there and it hadn't yet dissipated or been resolved. Things just weren't quite right. They hadn't forgiven her, not yet. She wasn't sure they ever would. She'd dropped in a few times since then, to check that they were okay and to try and build a relationship with them again. She'd told them all about the Marriage Law and that she was getting married. They hadn't been happy about that. Her mum had cried for hours and she'd cried with her and her dad had been hopelessly out of his depth, unable to protect his only daughter. She'd been and told them she was pregnant as well. Her mum was excited, her dad less so. They hadn't wanted this for her. They'd wanted her to marry for love, not for some law, and they'd wanted her to have a life, to really live, before she had children.

It was what she had wanted for herself as well. However, this was her life now and she had accepted it. It would always be this way, probably for the rest of her life. She'd never be able to marry a man she loved nor raise her children with her husband. It would be okay though. She would have to make it okay.

"Found anything yet, Hermione?" Ginny asked. She was subtly trying to draw her back into the conversation, Hermione realised, she must have noticed her distraction.

"Not yet..." She mused quietly. She felt a little dizzy, not quite right.

"Are you alright?" Padma asked. Her eyes were filled with concern. They all turned to look at her.

"I think my water just broke." Hermione said in a slightly dazed fashion. Suddenly, a wave of pain washed over her and she realised she'd just experienced her first contraction.

No one moved, everyone seemed to be frozen in place, as if someone had pressed pause over the situation. Thankfully, Ginny sprung into action and immediately went to Hermione's side, issuing orders as she did so. "Okay, we're going to go to Madam Pomfrey who will call a Healer. You won't be able to Apparate in your condition so you'll probably have to give birth here. Ron, Floo Mum, she'll want to be here. Harry, help me get Hermione there, I can't do it alone. Padma, go and see McGonagall and get her to alert Hermione's parents. Come on, let's go!" She clapped her hands like some sort of military commander and everyone got to their feet in a blur of movement and action.

Hermione nodded and let them help her to her feet. Truthfully, she didn't think she needed their help but the moment she stood up another contraction hit and she could barely stand. The pain was intense and she knew it would just get worse. She found herself wondering why on earth anyone would willingly go through all of this.

The book fell out of her lap and opened on a random page. She looked down, catching one last glimpse of the book, as Ginny pulled her away towards the Portrait Hole. She was just aware of the other students watching her, chattering excitedly. No doubt by the end of the day everyone would know she was having her baby.

"Gin-" She said, clutching her best friend's arm. "Stay with me. Please."

"Of course." Ginny said comfortingly. "I'll be there all the time. Everything will be fine, Hermione."

With some difficulty they made it to the Hospital Wing. Madam Pomfrey forced her into a bed and made her change into a hospital gown.

"I've called for a Healer, they'll be here any minute." Madam Pomfrey said briskly, displaying her efficiency.

Molly Weasley practically ran in, Ron trailing behind her, looking like he would like to be somewhere, anywhere, else. "Hermione, dear!" She took her other hand, the one that Ginny wasn't holding. Ron and Harry took the seats by her bed.

"Are you okay?" Molly asked in a motherly fashion. Hermione was like a daughter to her, she wasn't hers by blood but she might as well have been. Make no mistake about it, despite not being a Weasley by blood or by marriage, Hermione was one of the family. She always had been really and she always would be.

Hermione nodded once and cried out as another contraction hit.

"Looks like he's in a hurry," Madam Pomfrey said cheerfully. "That's good, a quick labour. It'll all be over soon."

"Can't you give me something to make it stop hurting?" Hermione said in a very irritable tone. She would have killed for morphine at this moment, for anything that would make the pain go away, or at least lessen.

"No, I'm afraid I can't do anything until the Healer is here, Hermione." Madam Pomfrey said lightly. Ginny squeezed her hand comfortingly. Hermione wanted, briefly, to inflict damage upon the school nurse. Didn't she know how Merlin awful this was?

The doors opened and McGonagall entered, followed by a Healer, who immediately took control of the situation.

"Thank Merlin." Hermione moaned. Her contractions were growing closer and closer together and growing in intensity and pain.

"Hermione, are you okay?" Minerva asked, carefully avoiding looking anywhere but at her face. Hermione's face contorted into a grimace of pain.

"Not really." She bit out.

"Ouch!" Ginny screamed. "That's my hand... you've really hurt me." She'd been holding Hermione's hand and during a particularly painful contraction, Hermione had gripped her hand tightly leaving nail marks in her palm.

Hermione just sent her a scathing look.

"Probably not the most tactful thing to say, Gin love." Harry said with a smirk. Ginny looked embarrassed.

"Are you the father?" The Healer asked Harry directly.

Harry let out a short bark of laughter. "No."

There was a pause.

"We should probably let him know." Molly said slowly.

Hermione shook her head frantically. "No. No, don't tell him. I don't want him here, he can't come in!"

"Calm down." The Healer soothed. "You need to relax."

"Please, don't let him come in here." Hermione begged.

"Look, it's okay. Me and Ron are gonna go and wait outside, we'll go and tell him when the baby's born and if he comes beforehand, then we won't let him in." Harry said soothingly. He kissed Hermione on the forehead. Ron gave her an encouraging smile and a quick wave and the two of them left. She noticed, with some amusement, that Ron had barely looked at her since entering the room and that his cheeks were a brilliant shade of red.

"Hermione, you're going to need to push in a moment. When you feel the urge, just do it. Don't hold back." The Healer said in a light, almost airy tone. Hermione felt an unexpected surge of hate for her. The stupid woman, didn't she know how much this hurt? How on earth could she be so breezy and cheerful at a time like this?

Sweet Merlin did it hurt. She'd never experienced anything like this before. She'd rather be Crucio-ed a hundred times rather than this, it would probably hurt less. Everything hurt, every muscle, every bone in her body. She couldn't hold back her screams and curses. Her hands were balled into fists, Ginny's hand squashed into hers. She should probably release Ginny but she couldn't quite make herself do it. She needed the comfort. Sweat was pouring from her every pore, running down her forehead and causing strands of her hair to stick uncomfortably to her. Someone, probably Molly Weasley, had pulled her hair back at some point and secured it with a hairband. She was boiling and there were so many people, all watching her, waiting for her.

She realised she hadn't answered the Healer. "Okay." She managed, through gritted teeth. "Okay."

When the urge came, she pushed and pushed, trying with everything she had in her to get the baby out. It hurt like hell, it felt like she was on fire, the pain licking up her flesh and burning her where she sat but it would stop soon, when the baby was out it would stop and it was this thought that made her keep pushing. She was shattered, her body aching and pleading with her to stop and rest but she couldn't. She made herself keep going, screaming and groaning with pain and the effort. The others were speaking, barely audible words, of encouragement and praise.

Suddenly a baby's cries tore through the air. The pain receded and her whole body collapsed into the bed. It was over.

She could see the Healer smiling and nodding, Molly Weasley was crying, Ginny was grinning and squeezing her hand, tears running down her face. Even McGonagall managed a smile.

It didn't matter. She couldn't even hear them properly or focus on them or what they were saying. Every fibre of her being was concentrated on the bundle wrapped up in the Healer's arms. Her baby. Her beautiful baby boy.

She stretched her arms out to him instinctively and the Healer held her baby out to her to take.

She was so very tired and she wanted nothing more than to lie down and go to sleep for a whole week but somehow she found the strength to take her son and hold him in her arms. He was beautiful, absolutely perfect and she was hit with a sudden surge of love for this tiny being who was so utterly dependent on her and so utterly perfect.

She knew without a doubt that she'd die for him, she'd do anything for him, for her beautiful baby. She wondered how she could ever even considered giving him up, she'd never let him go. Never.

"Theodore." She murmured quietly, brushing her lips across his head. "Divine gift."


	96. George and Luna 9

**A/N: For Whisperheart, Lady Eleanor Boleyn, K.-writter12, LovelyRoses, MidnightIsCalling, and Hufflepuff4ever.**

**I have now planned out how this will end and the build up to it – don't worry by my reckoning, I've still got over forty chapters left but I do believe the end is (slowly) getting into sight!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

George x Luna

"Are you sure you want to do this?" He asked.

She nodded decisively. "Of course. It's very important that we do this. And it'll be fun." She grinned and he smiled back, unable to stop himself, even if he had wanted to do so. He loved her so very much, any sign of her happiness made him want to grin like a fool. He just couldn't help it.

He'd never imagined that his life would take this path – the marriage law, marrying Luna Lovegood, having a life with her, children with her – but he was extremely glad it had. He couldn't imagine things any other way. He wondered sometimes how he had ever been happy without her. She was perfect, absolutely perfect.

"Are you gonna be okay though? Should you...y'know, in your condition?" He asked worriedly, laying a hand on her arm.

She sighed. "I'm pregnant, George, not disabled. I can do this and then afterwards I'll go lie down, if it'll make you feel better."

She was being sarcastic (this was quite rare – he thought it was a side effect of living with him, it must have rubbed off on her), he knew this, but he replied seriously. "Yeah, it would actually. And if you get too tired or whatever, you should go lie down and I'll finish it."

She rolled her eyes. "I'll be fine. Promise." She kissed him quickly, before he could respond she'd pulled away and danced over to the paint.

She'd bought loads of tins, it seemed like too many to him but then again, he didn't really know anything about it. She'd gone to a special Muggle shop to buy it, although she was a little...zany at times, she was particularly good with Muggles. She just sort of blended in and you couldn't tell she was anything but your average, everyday Muggle.

She'd told him all about it, how she'd had to ask an attendant and how they'd let her look at all these little bits of paper with different colours on. She had neither told him nor shown him the colours she had chosen and he was slightly apprehensive about it. Her taste was usually quite unconventional and possibly very bright. Apparently, they'd mixed it up for her, taken it off this little bit of paper and made a whole tin of it with a special machine. You had to hand it to the Muggles, they were pretty ingenious.

"Have you got a screwdriver?" She asked earnestly, holding a small tin of paint in her hand.

He blinked. "I have no idea what that is...but, can't you just use a spell?"

She shook her head. "Absolutely not. We're doing this without magic, George. I've told you that already!"

They couldn't find a screwdriver, or anything else suitable to remove the lid, and she didn't want to go out again to a shop to find one, so she finally agreed to let him Transfigure a kitchen fork into one. (Actually, she had to do the Transfiguration because he still had no idea what a screwdriver was.)

She prised the lid off carefully. He looked down, a little nervously, at the colour. Blue. He exhaled slowly with relief – it was okay, nothing too garish, quite nice really.

She turned to some of the other tins and one by one removed all of the lids.

They were all different shades of blue – some very light, others much darker. There was also one very large tin of a sort of sky blue. There was also a large tin of brilliant white.

She held up a sort of long sponge thing on a stick. He blinked. "What in Merlin's name is that?"

"This is a roller. You use it to paint. Look, I'll demonstrate then you can start." He watched, with interest, as she poured some into a sort of tray and then dipped this roller thing in and applied some of the paint to the walls.

He'd never done decorating the Muggle way before, it was all new to him and quite interesting. He didn't realise it was such hard work though – Luna had insisted they take all the furniture out and lay huge white sheets on the floor ('to stop paint getting on it' – apparently, he didn't bother reminding her they were a wizard and witch respectively and therefore able to clean quickly and effectively with magic).

"Why've you got all these different blues?" He ventured. Luna had, so far, been very mysterious about what their baby's room would look like.

"Well, it's going to be a sky." She said, looking rather pleased with herself. "We'll do it all this blue first-" She gestured to the largest tin. "And then add little bits of the other blues and use sponges to do big white clouds."

He grinned. "Sounds absolutely perfect. Let's get started!"

About half an hour later, he was slightly regretting his decision. It was actually quite difficult using this roller thing. He'd only done about half a wall, Luna had nearly finished one already and had progressed to something called 'cutting in'.

It involved going around all of the edges of the room with a little paintbrush to make sure they were all neat and even. He had to admit it made the room look better but it seemed like a lot of work, in his opinion. If he'd used magic, he would have finished by now and have had all the furniture back in and had everywhere perfectly clean and tidy.

He didn't mind though. It was, he admitted to himself, kind of fun. He liked the idea that he had contributed, really contributed through manual labour, to creating their child's room. It felt more personal as well, much more personal than if he'd simply used a spell to charm the walls.

"It's better this way, isn't it?" Her voice cut through his thoughts. She sounded a little smug. He'd been a bit opposed to painting the walls the Muggle way, truth be told it had just seemed like a lot of effort.

"Yeah." He admitted with a sigh. He didn't have to look at her to know she was grinning happily.

She began humming softly, a tune he almost but not quite recognised. He found himself stopping just to watch her. She was beautiful. As he watched, she moved into an unexpected patch of sunlight. With her blonde hair and tranquil expression and now this bath of golden light, she looked like an angel, he thought. He was pretty glad that no one could read his thoughts, Fred would have a field day if he had even a five second snapshot of what he was thinking.

His eyes dropped to her stomach, swollen with their child. She was six months pregnant and determined that this fact would not stop her doing anything. She still rushed around, doing whatever she pleased and refusing any help or rest. There was nothing he could do to get her to slow down – and even if there were he wouldn't want to restrict her or be too overbearing – it was just the way she was.

It took them another hour to get the first coat of sky blue on. She stood in the middle of the room, surveying it. He wrapped an arm around her waist.

"Looks good, doesn't it?" He said.

She nodded. "Yes, I really think it does. I'm sure our child will love it."

He slipped his hand onto her stomach. "I'm sure he or she will."

She leaned into him, subconsciously, and he smiled. It always surprised him how in sync they were, particularly in how they moved.

It took them the whole afternoon to finish the room. Luna had taken charge of adding the other colours in, she had gotten a little bossy ordering him about and telling him precisely where to put the different colours. He quite liked this bossy side of her, he thought it was sweet how precisely she had planned this out, how perfect she wanted everything. Perfect for their baby.

He never got tired of saying those two words – 'their baby'. He was ecstatic that he was going to become a father. George was a little nervous, as all soon to be fathers are, and he knew that Luna was a little nervous as well about her own mothering abilities. He had no such concerns; he knew that Luna would be a fantastic mum to his kids, their kids. He hoped they'd have lots.

He'd grown up in a big family and knew what it was like to have the constant love and companionship of lots of siblings. He wanted that for his own children and he knew that Luna did as well. She hadn't liked being an only child and had often been lonely, particularly in the school holidays, she'd always longed for a huge family with two loving parents, lots of siblings and lots of extended family as well. Of course, being a Weasley now, she had lots and lots of family to call her own, just as their children would have.

She took over the clouds, rolling her sleeves up and using a sponge to create these big, fluffy clouds. He watched her, her nose screwed up at the end with concentration, tiny splatters of paint, both white and blue, on her face and hands and clothes.

Finally, she sat back on her heels and permitted herself a brief smile. He went over to her side and held out his hands to help her to her feet.

"Finished now, love?" He asked, still holding her in his arms. He always felt most comfortable when he was holding her, like things were exactly right, like they were meant to be.

"Yes, I think so. D'you like it?" She bit on her lip as if she were concerned at his answer.

"Of course I do, I think it's amazing." He reassured her.

She smiled, satisfied. "I'm glad we did this."

"Me too, it feels more...well...just..." He trailed off, not quite sure of the words to use.

She just nodded. "I know."

"Now will you please go and lie down and rest?"

She wrinkled her nose and opened her mouth to protest. He leaned down and kissed her, cutting off any kind of reply. "You promised." He reminded her, kissing her again.


	97. Percy and Cho 7

**A/N: For FlutePower, Lady Eleanor Boleyn, Merts, mehmoosh, tamara72 and forever12.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. And I really hate disclaimers.**

Percy x Cho

This was pretty weird for him. It was going to be a whole new experience. He'd never shared a house with anyone apart from his family members. Now, his new wife was moving in with him.

She'd suggested it. Her lease on her flat was running out and her landlord was selling up. She couldn't afford to buy it and he had a perfectly good place where he was. He lived in London, close to the Ministry for work but also close to everything else – to good shops and restaurants and people. It was a good place to live, he loved living there. Although he loved being at home, with his family, he also loved city life. He liked the new people he met and the things he saw and having everything right there on his doorstep. He liked having his own place as well, it was nice to have a bit of space sometimes.

She'd brought the whole subject up over a late coffee morning. He'd rushed in, ten minutes late as per usual, to find that she had found a corner booth, had seated herself in it and proceeded to order them both drinks. It had been one of the very first things she had said, no build up, no pleasantries, just a quick hello and then wham, right in there.

He'd felt a bit bad about it later, when he'd had some time to think it over. He'd known about her housing situation and hadn't even considered asking her to move in with him. He should have thought of it before. Truth be told, it hadn't even crossed his mind. He hadn't really thought they were...well, at that stage in their relationship.

Their relationship was...complicated. They were legally married and obliged to have children together. The marriage law was quite likely to be a lifelong commitment; there was very little chance they would ever be able to separate. They were in this for the long haul, as Cho had said, perhaps even forever. He was right on the inside of the Ministry and hadn't picked up any wavering in the hardline stance the Ministry were taking.

Neither had wanted to marry. It was altogether very odd. He'd never even spoken to Cho at school. She'd been a Ravenclaw in Ron's year, he'd been older and in a different house. Their paths had never had any cause to cross. He hadn't even really noticed her and she'd said, quite frankly, she'd only known who he was because he had been Head Boy. He'd also found out that she'd dated Harry for some time and before that she'd been with Cedric Diggory. That was a little unnerving – after those two war heroes, one the greatest war hero of all – how on earth could she ever settle for him?

Not that, you know, he was sure he wanted her to settle. He wasn't sure quite what he wanted.

It was an uncomfortable situation they found themselves in. Both wanted to be happy, Cho wanted her domestic bliss and both wanted to follow the law.

To do so, and to have a good life, they had to make the best of a bad situation.

Thing was, neither was entirely sure they wanted to do that with each other. There was no denying the cold hard facts. Neither wanted to be together. If they had a choice, they would never stay together or have chosen each other. They were woefully unsuited.

They'd tried to spend more time together recently, besides the compulsory stuff. They spoke a lot and wrote letters occasionally. He didn't have a lot of time to spare. Work had relaxed a little recently, since the Harry and Ginny scandal had been resolved and the clamour surrounding it had died down, but there was no denying that his work was busy and demanding.

He'd enjoyed getting to know Cho far more than he ever thought he would. He'd found that she was a genuinely nice person. She had this quite tough exterior but behind that she was quite shy and definitely damaged by the war. He liked her, he thought she was a good person.

He found himself confiding in her, something about her invited confidence. She was a good listener – quiet when you were talking and asking questions, casually prompting you to continue without actually seeming to do so. She spoke the absolute truth as well. She said what she thought, with no editing or whatever. To some people this may come across as rude or harsh, he found it refreshing.

She would have been a really good friend. If they had been in the same year at Hogwarts, and possibly in the same house, there was a real chance they could have become real, natural friends.

That was probably the problem – they were just friends.

There was no attraction there, no spark, no chemistry. When they spoke, it felt like he was speaking to his friend, rather than his wife. He strongly suspected that their feelings for each other would never develop beyond this stage. They would never grow into something more, develop into real adult love. They were friends. That was it.

He thought that her moving in would be a bit like having a housemate. Only, of course, she would be sleeping in his bed and had his last name. Apart from those minor details, it would be like rooming with a friend, which would probably be quite nice.

She was moving in today, after work. His work, not hers. She didn't have a job. She'd explained that she had been looking but, obviously, she would get pregnant soon and have to give it up anyway. That was another thing he liked about her – she was practical and sensible. She understood the consequences of this marriage law and seemed to have accepted them now.

He could provide for them both and she had some savings which she had insisted on donating. They would be fine, financially speaking. It would be harder when they had children but they would scrape by. They would never be as poor as his own family had been. He'd promised himself that he would do better for his children, all of his siblings had. He knew that none of them ever wanted their children to grow up with as little as they had had.

Not that they hadn't had a fantastic childhood, because they had, they really had. It had just been a sparse one filled with the certain knowledge that they'd never have the newest or the best of anything. Of course, they had had each other and that had been enough.

He looked around his house, satisfied. He'd never thought he'd be able to afford his own house, expecting instead to only be able to afford a flat, an apartment maybe at a stretch. He'd been saving up ever since he'd first found work at the Ministry. Living on his own, he had found, was not all that costly.

He'd finally managed to buy this place about six months ago – sometime between the war ending and the marriage law being introduced.

It was only a two up, two down but it was enough. They could always add to it later, when they had the money and the time. Downstairs, there was a kitchen/dining room (dining room was probably a bit of an exaggeration, there was a little table and two chairs wedged into a nonexistent space in one corner) and a living room. Upstairs was the bedroom and the bathroom.

Ideally, he would have like to have a spare bedroom to offer her. He felt stupid even admitting that much – they were married for Merlin's sakes, where else would she sleep but with him? He just knew, however, that sleeping in the same bed would be awkward for both of them.

It would take them into a whole new phase, completely out of his comfort zone (and, so he strongly suspected, out of hers as well). Even living together was a big step. A really really big step.

Their relationship, at present, was working. It was by no means perfect though. They still had a lot of awkward silences which neither knew how to fill or how to make them less awkward. They still didn't find the same things funny. They didn't really have any interest in the other's interests.

It wasn't perfect. It was shaky and still developing.

He was worried that living together would ruin even this tentative friendship. He couldn't say anything though. Cho was coming to live with him. That was a fact. There was no way he could back out now. She didn't have anywhere else to go and she would be angry and that would destroy their friendship anyway.

Who knows? Maybe this would be good for them. Maybe they would learn to like each other, the way they were supposed to, the way the contracts were supposed to make them feel. Maybe they would even develop a better friendship.

Friendship was a good start. He didn't want to have children with a women whom he didn't even like. That would never do. What impact would that have on the children, knowing that their parents didn't like each other and would never have been together had they had a choice?

He had to make the best of this. He had to.

For him. For Cho. For their future. For their happiness. For their children.

Above all, for their children.

And those reasons he would make the best of this, he would embrace his new role as a husband, he would try and learn to love his wife, he would try and do this right, be a proper husband and father. He had to.


	98. Draco and Katie 10

**A/N: Draco and Katie for Whisperheart, lovenotwarXo, forever12, Cherelle Potter, Elise Cullen, Rueflowersmall and delicate and tamara72.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Draco x Katie

He wasn't used to girls, women, like Katie. Not at all. The females he had been brought up with were quite different. They made polite, light conversation and laughed easily. They had impeccable manners and a thorough understanding of various social situations and the etiquette, behaviour and dress associated with each. They wore costly dresses in luxurious fabrics such as silk and were always immaculately turned out no matter the time or place.

Katie rebuffed any attempt he made at conversation and never even cracked a smile at any joke, or attempt at humour, he made (although he suspected this was deliberate and that she purposefully didn't laugh even if she did find him funny). She had manners, sure enough, just not particularly refined ones, she didn't care about eating too much or saying the wrong thing, she knew nothing of Pureblood culture, and to be quite frank, she didn't seem to want to enhance her non-existent knowledge. She wore whatever she wanted to, he'd even seen her wear an over sized vest and cotton shorts to bed, she often had messy hair and wore make up when she could be bothered to which was mostly never.

She was different.

And yet, there was something about her that drew him in.

Maybe it was her smile, which graced her face so rarely he found himself trying everything and anything to raise even the merest grin from her. Maybe it was the way she lit up the room just by walking in, her face so alive, her movements free. The other girls in the room seemed dull and stifled compared to her. Maybe it was simply that she was different and that that fact intrigued him.

Whatever it was, he was inexplicably drawn to her.

At first, it had all been about physical attraction brought on mostly by the charms but also through the fact that she was an attractive girl. It wasn't like that anymore, well of course it was, he was still a man after all, but it was different.

She was married to him, yes, and slept with him, yes. But it wasn't enough. She was forced to do those things, she'd never do it out of free will.

He had her, but the most important part of her she kept locked away from him. He wanted her heart, her love. He wanted her to love him.

He didn't actually want to love her back. What he felt for her was not love, it was an intense attraction coupled with a liking. It wasn't actual love and he would never let it develop into such a thing.

He wanted her to love him without any reciprocation on his part.

That was probably rather twisted, he knew this, but it was the way most Pureblood marriages worked. His mother was devoted to his father, unconditionally, yet his father could leave her in a heartbeat and never feel even the slightest wrench. That was how he saw marriage. He didn't know any other way.

Having Kate love him, really love him, would be the ultimate prize. Having a girl like Katie as his wife was already pretty impressive, his friends had been impressed – she was different to the typical Purebloods, different in a good way, she managed to fit in and yet stand out completely. If the law had never come about, he would never have married Katie. He wouldn't have noticed her and she would never have even talked to him, let alone married him. But having her heart, her love, well that would be the icing on the cake.

He was, in some ways, glad he had Katie. He had wondered, when the law was first announced, if he would end up with Pansy Parkinson or someone like that, perhaps one of the Greengrass sisters or, Merlin forbid, Millicent Bulstrode.

They would all have been perfectly acceptable wives, they would know exactly what was expected of a Pureblood wife and would act accordingly. They would have no individuality though. There would be no spark, no rebellion, no... spirit. If there was one thing Katie did have, it was spirit. She had a whole lot of spirit.

She could be the perfect wife, if she wished to be. She didn't. And she had made damn sure that everyone knew that. Even now, whilst he was in the study, she was probably off somewhere doing something his mother would be scandalised about if she knew. Freeing house elves, probably, or visiting the Weasel blood traitors she seemed to love so much or wearing jeans or whatever else she did.

She did it all to wind up his mother, of course. It worked, it worked incredibly well. His mother spent most of her time trying to turn Katie into a younger version of herself and Kate was valiantly resisting her efforts at every chance she got.

Kate didn't bother trying to wind him up, not directly. She did it more subtly. Little things like refusing to acknowledge him when he opened doors for her or ignoring him most of the time. It irritated him no end that she seemed so immune to his charms.

And he had been charming with her. He'd been polite and funny and sweet and utterly charming, he'd really laid it on thick trying to get her to fall for him. She hadn't even seemed to notice. She'd merely brushed him off as if he were a particularly annoying fly. She was utterly immune to him.

Acting entirely on instinct, he stood up, brushed imaginary crumbs from his clothing and decided to go and find said wife. He was thoroughly bored of pretending to do paper work, someone else would do it for him and do it far better than he ever could, finding Kate would be a far more enjoyable and interesting task.

He wasn't expecting her to be friendly or welcoming but it never hurt to flatter her a bit. Maybe over time she would warm to him. Anyway, it was almost lunch time, perhaps she would allow him to escort her down.

He found her, eventually, in the small library. It had been his aunt's room, his father's youngest sister. Of course she had had her own suite of rooms but this library had been hers. It had a more feminine feel than the main library. He, personally, didn't much like the room. It was too...girly. It was, in his eyes, a wasted room, if Kate didn't like it so much he would have it turned into a study or something.

His aunt had been somewhat of a free spirit during her youth, she had conformed in the end though, his grandmother was a formidable woman and had eventually threatened to disown her if she did not act as she should. It had been enough. Without her family name and wealth, his aunt had nothing and she had known it. She had risen through the ranks, marrying a very wealthy man with an excellent, very old family name, to become one of the highest Pureblood society ladies.

"What are you doing in here?" He asked curiously. She was curled up in one of the chairs, legs tucked underneath her in a fashion which would have made his mother wince in horror, and a patch of sunlight shone through the fake window, basking her in its' glow. She looked rather angelic, he thought.

"Reading." She said, her eyes not leaving the page of her book for one second.

"What're you reading?" He settled himself into the armchair opposite her.

"A book."

Ah, she was in that mood – the one where she only answered direct questions in monosyllabic, unhelpful answers. "I can see that, what sort of book? Did you get it from here?"

She nodded. "It came from here, I don't own any books and there's such a large collection here."

"There are more in the main library if you are interested."

"I'm not. Those books are not about the sorts of things I want to read about."

"You're not interested in politics? In law? In finance?" He questioned, sure she would have at least a low level interest in these things.

"Surely you don't want a wife with a brain?" She said. Her tone was sweet but there was a definite edge of malice and spite in her words.

"Well that's not true at all." He replied honestly. "I never intended to marry a girl with nothing to say for herself."

"You mean Parkinson has an original thought?" She said sarcastically.

"I was never going to marry Pansy. We dated at Hogwarts, for a short while, but we were better suited as friends, even now we are friends."

"You're friends...with her?" Her face was almost comical in it's' expression of utter disgust.

"She really isn't that bad." He said. "Honestly. She's...nicer to her own housemates. She'd probably be alright to you now."

"Because I'm your wife? Because suddenly I'm 'one of you'?"

"Yes." He said simply. That was the truth. Pansy, and Blaise and most of his other friends, would be far more civil to Katie because she was his wife and as such demanded respect and civility.

Of course, Kate was Pureblooded so they would have spoken to her before, perhaps not in a friendly manner but they would have spoken, but now, now she was one of them. She just didn't want to admit it.

The position fit her well. She could have been born into this life. He could imagine her fitting in, slipping seamlessly into the role of a high society Pureblood. She could have been one of them, part of the select band of Slytherins that he mingled with - socialising at balls, meeting for afternoon lunch, partnering each other at dances. Even now, if she wished to accept such a role (and he highly doubted she ever would), she could be one of them. The others would accept her – Blaise, Theodore, Millicent, Goyle, the Greengrass sisters. She could be one of them.

"That's a disgusting way of thinking." She said. She was trying to provoke a reaction out of him, he could tell.

"Yes."

"Why aren't you defending them?" She said irritably.

He noted, with some pleasure, that she had finally tore her gaze away from the ever so fascinating book and had let it drop limply onto her lap. "Because I cannot. What you are saying is entirely correct and there is nothing I can say to make it seem better or more pleasant. There is no defence for the way we think, it is ingrained into us from birth, perhaps it is in our blood. Whatever it is, this is how we are."

"It's wrong. It's really wrong. People like you with your airs and graces and blood superiority are the reason the war happened." She said angrily, fists clenching.

"People like me are not the cause of the war! Don't you dare blame us for something you know nothing about. You think we wanted this? Me and Blaise and Pansy and the rest. We had our lives wrecked just as much as you did. Yes we were on a different side and admittedly for a long while our lives were easier, but the fear and the intimidation and the threat was still there. One wrong move, one wrong word, and we could have been killed. You think we didn't pray for the day the war would end just as much as you did?" He said furiously, sitting up straighter, his anger nearly propelling him up out of his chair.

Katie blinked once. He was really riled, clearly this had really upset him. Maybe she had pushed him too far this time. He was breathing heavily, his pale skin flushed with anger, his hands balled up into fists. She doubted he would actually hurt her but it was best to be safe. Provoking him further now would be like waving a red flag at an angry bull. She needed to calm him, soothe him. "It's easy to blame you." She said quietly, avoiding eye contact.

"What?" He said harshly. "What in Merlin's name are you talking about?"

"It's easy to blame you for everything. For the war and for the people we lost and for how awful it all was. And for the law, for this marriage, for how my life is now. You're an easy target. I can blame you and pretend like there is nothing else influencing it. I have no one else to blame so I take it out on you, sometimes unfairly, perhaps sometimes justly." Her mouth turned up at the corners very faintly as she finished her little monologue.

There was a long silence whilst he composed his thoughts. "I understand. Life isn't fair, not at all, and right now it's pretty bad for you. Although it probably doesn't mean much, I apologise for whatever part I have played in that."

He rose to his feet, she was still staring numbly ahead, and as he turned to go he caught the faintest whisper.

"It means more than you think."


	99. Harry and Ginny 9

**A/N: For Lady Eleanor Boleyn, gWeasley77, forever12, Mint and lemon and Elise Cullen.**

**I hate to dash your hopes, but for those who are hoping for Blaise and Hermione to fall miraculously in love, it's not happening. Yes I am a big shipper of Hermione/some evil Slytherin and those stories where he is transformed by the power of love, no it isn't happening here. I don't think it's at all realistic with my story and I believe Hermione as a strong female, is perfectly capable of raising her son alone with help from the Weasleys. Sorry guys!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Harry x Ginny

It had been three weeks, four days and about five hours since the marriage contracts, which prevented them from really being together, had been dissolved.

It had been three weeks, four days, four hours, fifty nine minutes and thirty seconds since they had had that first tentative hug (which had been swiftly followed by a kiss, and then numerous kisses).

It had been about seven and a half minutes since she had wordlessly cast a single charm and settled on the bathroom floor to wait.

It wasn't a particularly pleasant place to wait really. The floor was cold and hard, uncomfortable even. She should have gotten up long ago or perhaps seated herself on the toilet seat or the bathroom counter instead, if only she'd thought of that before. She should probably get up now.

She didn't.

She stayed on the floor, cold and cramped, with her legs crossed neatly like she was still in school or something. She couldn't quite make herself get up. Not just yet.

It was comforting down here. Not comfortable, that was an entirely different thing, but comforting. Things were safe and easy, she didn't have to do anything, there were no life changing moments down here. It was okay here.

The charm had worked. She could feel it. It had worked about two seconds after she had cast it actually. Unfortunately, her eyes were closed thereby preventing her from seeing its' result.

She wasn't one hundred percent sure what she wanted the result to be.

One the one hand, it would be nice if it was a yes. On the other, she'd only just gotten her life back and it would be easier if it were a no.

She took a deep breath. She needed to compose herself. What if someone came in and found her like this? It was quite likely that within the next few minutes someone would come and find her. It would probably be Harry, wondering where she was because they were never separated for longer than about ten minutes these days. Or Padma, sent to find her because Harry couldn't get into the girls' dormitories. If it had been just a few days earlier, it would have been Hermione, worrying about a baby issue or about her awful mother in law, as it was Hermione was living at The Burrow, with Theo (although Hermione didn't like people calling him Theo, she always, always called him by his full name).

She missed Hermione. A lot. Hermione was her best friend, the one she could turn to whenever, wherever, whatever. Hermione would have known exactly what to do, her calm rationale would have smoothed the situation out, she would have rationally, coolly discussed the options, helped her to come to a rational conclusion and she most certainly would not have allowed Ginny to be sitting on the bathroom floor, eyes closed.

Maybe she should just look at the result and then deal with it. Or not. It was much easier not to. It was easy, sitting here, to pretend like nothing had happened, like nothing was wrong.

Channelling her inner Hermione (a side of herself Ginny hadn't really realised existed until now), she took a deep breath and cleared her head.

What would Hermione do?

Consider both sides and work out what would be the positives and negatives of either option, deciding what the worst possible scenario would be and how likely said scenario was.

Option One: she is pregnant. Her and Harry would have this baby (well, she would technically have the baby, but Harry would obviously be there). She would barely even be showing by the time they left school and would be able to complete her education therefore ensuring that when her children were grown, she had some qualifications to fall back on. They already have a house, Grimmauld Place and Harry has a trainee position pretty much secured in the Auror Department. They'll be fine for money and accommodation. Her mother is desperate for grandchildren and so will be on hand at all times to assist, if need be. Ginny herself wasn't exactly adverse to the idea of having children. She had always wanted to be a mother (admittedly she had envisioned being a little older) and when the law came into place she knew that having children was an inevitability. Everyone else is having children so they'll all be in the same boat, in fact she would be in the minority if she wasn't having a baby yet. And, of course this will be Harry's baby and she knows he will be a really good dad and will be thrilled if she is pregnant.

So far, so good.

Option Two: it is a false alert and she's not pregnant. She can finish school without a care in the world. She can go out and actually get a job and have a bit of a life before motherhood. They don't have an awful lot of money to spare, she knows that Harry has an inheritance but that won't last forever, not if they have to pay bills and for baby stuff and trainee Aurors don't earn a lot. They're so young as well, they're just kids themselves - how on earth can she raise a baby? And she's just got Harry back, she doesn't know if she wants to share him, not just yet. They haven't had a 'honeymoon period' – they were fugitives, secretly married then cruelly torn apart. They've only been reunited a few months, if she is pregnant she'll never have him all to herself again and she doesn't know if she can take that.

The worst case scenario is she finds out she's pregnant only for Harry to be killed in a freak accident which looks suspiciously like she has caused it, she has to go through motherhood alone, all of her family blame her for the accident (as does the entire Wizarding world) so she is completely alone, the child looks just like Harry therefore reminding her of Harry every single day and when it grows up it hates her, blaming her for it's father's death, and runs off to live with the rest of her family, never seeing her again. She dies all alone in some Merlin awful flat, probably completely senile and utterly heartbroken, and no one finds her dead body for three days, alerted by the smell of her rotting body and the constant mewling of her thirty odd cats.

Like she said, worst case scenario.

Likelihood of this happening? Very unlikely bordering impossible.

It couldn't be all that bad. She could see positives for both sides. She wasn't sure what she wanted the outcome to be, besides if she chose a side then she had a fifty fifty chance and might end up disappointed. If she was neutral, like she was, then it wouldn't matter either way because she would be happy either way.

She was rambling now. She knew. Mind rambling. Her brain just wouldn't shut up. It was probably a sign of nervousness. Or something.

She squeezed her eyes even tighter shut and tried breathing in and out a few times.

She should have taken up breathing exercises, maybe even tried some Muggle yoga. She'd seen a poster, during the summer holidays, advertising classes nearby. She should have gone. It would have helped her to relax and breathe properly and then she wouldn't be in a situation like this because she would be able to do a Sun pose or a Dog stretch or something and calm herself down. She'd definitely missed an opportunity there.

And she was definitely babbling far too much.

She had to get up and get off of this floor and find out once and for all whether or not she was pregnant.

One step and a time, then, it would be easier that way. Firstly, she groped blindly for the bathroom counter. It was somewhere to her left. She found the cool marble surface and used it to pull herself up to her feet.

Okay, she was up and no longer on the floor. There, that wasn't so hard was it?

She stretched out her legs and fidgeted for a moment trying to regain the feeling in her feet. The floor had been really uncomfortable.

Carefully and very slowly, she peeled one eye open, avoiding even glancing at her stomach. Instead she stared straight ahead at her own reflection.

She forced herself to open the other eye. Okay, Ginny time to grow up and get a grip. Just look down, that's all you have to do. You don't mind what the result is – you'd be happy either way.

She peeked down.

A little round blue circle was floating by her stomach, as she watched, it flashed white and disappeared.

She was pregnant.

Merlin.

Oh Merlin.

Her mind was out of control cursing excessively and spinning wildly until only random snatches of half formed words could be heard. What was she going to do?

This could not feasibly end well. She couldn't be a mother. She was only just an adult herself. What was she going to do?

A tentative knock on the door broke through her thoughts, which by this point were borderline hysterical.

"Yeah?" She managed to call out.

"Erm...it's me, Gin." It was Padma – obviously sent by Harry, a fact confirmed by her next few words. "Harry's looking for you."

"Okay, I'll be down in a sec." She was rather proud of how steady her voice sounded. She sounded calm and in control. Pretty much the exact opposite of how she was really feeling. She needed to pull it together. A stern little voice, which sounded like a weird cross between her mother, Hermione and Professor McGonagall spoke to her.

_Okay Ginny, calm down. Harry will freak out if he sees you like this, you need to pull it together for his sake. He's been through enough without you acting like a total emotional wreck, basket case, loony on him. Pull it together. Yes, it's scary. Yes, it's frightening. Yes, you are young. But you'll be okay. Hermione is managing and she's all alone. You have Harry, who will be thrilled by the news and a really good father. You have your family who will support you through everything. You don't have to worry about money or security. Not everyone has those things, you're very lucky and you will be okay. _

Slowly, she managed to breathe in and out again like a normal person and made her mind calm down somewhat. Okay it was scary, terrifying even, but she had faced worse. She'll be okay – she has people around her to help her and love her. She'd be okay.


	100. Blaise and Hermione 12

**A/N: For Fernsong, tamara72, christy86, Whisperheart, jorg0382, missb14 and Bergere.**

**I am very proud to say that this is the 100th chapter. I never thought it would go on this long or that people would actually like it and stick with it. I would like to thank you all for continuing to read my work and a special thanks to everyone who reviews - you make my day, honestly.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Blaise x Hermione

Blaise Zabini was furious. Absolutely fuming. In fact, words alone couldn't even express the depth of his anger.

The stupid Mudblood. How could she do this?

She'd had the baby. His baby. His heir.

She'd had it and hadn't even told him until afterwards, even then she hadn't sent for him. She'd sent Potter and Weasel to tell him. They'd informed him that his son had been born, that he was healthy, and that he, Blaise, was not allowed to visit. Apparently, Hermione didn't want him to.

They were allowed to see his son, to hold his son, and he wasn't. It wasn't right – he was the father. He had rights too. It was his son!

He hadn't even been told the baby's name. Potter and Weasley hadn't known it at that point. He wasn't exactly on speaking terms with those that would know and so he couldn't even put a name to his son. He was the father and he didn't even know the name of his baby, he couldn't tell his own mother what her grandson's name was.

He and Hermione had never discussed names. Never even mentioned it. He had just assumed that Granger would want to name him and he had been happy to go along with that. He just hoped Hermione had named him something acceptable.

He wouldn't put it past Granger to name it something awful, something very Muggle. That wouldn't do. He would have liked to have had some say in it, perhaps used the traditional middle name of his family or something. Not likely that Granger would allow that though. She would undoubtedly want him to have as little influence as possible over anything even vaguely related to their children.

Granger had probably given him some Merlin awful common name, following this with her father's name as a middle name or perfect Potter's name or something like that (he refused to even consider the possibility that she had used Weasley's name as the middle name – no child of his would have the middle name Ronald, he just wouldn't stand for it )and then hyphenated the surname to put her own name in it. The only influence he would have would be the Zabini right at the very end.

It would be awful. How would he ever live this down?

He wanted to see his son. It was his right to. Okay, he was letting Granger take care of the baby full time but he still expected to get access, weekend visitation or something, she couldn't just freeze him out like this. It wasn't right.

He knew she was planning on moving in with the Weasley family when she left the Hospital Wing. When she had finished her final exams, he had offered to buy her a house. She had neither accepted nor rejected his offer. He was still quite prepared to buy her a place to live though. If she wouldn't live with him (and she wouldn't, and more importantly he didn't actually want her to), then he should, quite rightly, provide his child and, subsequently, the mother of his child with adequate accommodation. He had plenty of money, she could choose the location and the house. He would have no say in it again but that didn't matter – he wouldn't have to live there.

She would probably want to pay him back. That was fine with him. It was a matter of pride for her and he understood that. He would let her do so, in her own time, but he would fudge the figures a little and he was definitely not charging her any interest.

He decided to write to her. Charging into the Hospital Wing would be rude and she would probably force him to leave. He would send her a letter first, asking permission and giving her forewarning that he wanted to visit his son. If she said no, he would have to go to someone high up (probably McGonagall – although she had a real soft spot for Granger, the woman was still scrupulously fair and would at least talk to Granger for him). He didn't want to do that though. He didn't want to risk Hermione turning against him and denying him any form of access.

'_Hermione,_

_Congratulations on a safe delivery. If you would permit it, I would like to visit you and my son as soon as possible._

_Blaise'_

Short, simple, to the point.

He sent it at once, reasoning that the sooner she got it, the sooner she could reply and the sooner he could see his son.

His mother was also desperate to see her grandson but Hermione loathed his mother, it would be pushing her too far if he asked to let his mother visit as well. His mother would have to wait awhile, perhaps until his son was old enough for weekend visits.

He wasn't stupid. He knew that his son would be too young and too dependent on Hermione to be away for a whole weekend, he would have to be at least six months old before he could come and stay at weekends. That suited him just fine; in six months he would have done with Hogwarts and would have weekends free at home with his son. He would have his mother on hand to help him out and perhaps they could hire a nanny, just to assist. It would be fine. He was looking forward to it already.

He just wanted to see his son.

He didn't have to wait long for a reply – it came just under an hour later.

'_Blaise,_

_You could come for an hour this afternoon, after last lesson._

_Hermione'_

She sounded distinctly unwilling to have him. She was even rationing the time he was allowed to spend with his son.

He'd take what he could get.

Later on, perhaps he would be allowed more time. He probably had to prove to her that he really did care about his son.

Most Pureblood fathers had little to no interest in their children. The interest level usually rose a little when their offspring were ready to either inherit or marry off, dependent on their gender. He, however, was different. He actually did want to have some sort of relationship with his son.

His own father had been absent his whole life and he didn't want that for his children. His own father had been his mother's first love and had run off when Blaise had been just a baby. His mother had never really recovered from her broken heart and wounded pride. She had tried to cover the cracks in her life and mask her humiliation by marrying any guy who asked her. These days she didn't fall in love, she wasn't even capable of it. She had been hurt too badly.

He wanted to know his son, was that such a crime? He knew his peers would find it amusing, would laugh at him, would mock him for letting Granger have all the control. He didn't care, he could take their jibes. The ones that mattered would not mind – his mother, for example, would be thrilled if he showed even the briefest flicker of interest towards his child.

He didn't see why Hermione had to have such a measure of control over it though. He bet she loved the sense of power she had, being able to hold something like this over him. He didn't see why he had to jump through hoops just to spend time with his only son.

True he disliked Hermione and what she was, but his son was exactly that – his son. He had sworn to love all of his children, regardless of their blood status and their mother. It was hardly their fault. He would love his three children and have as little to do with their mother as possible. He supposed she would do the same. It wasn't as if they would ever be a happy family, neither of them wanted that. This was how it would have to be. It wasn't ideal but it would how things were.

Finally, it was time to go visit his son. He had been impatient for it all afternoon, fidgeting his way through Potions lesson, ignoring the disapproving looks he received from Slughorn. The Professor didn't matter, his child mattered.

Hermione was the only patient in the Hospital Wing. She had obviously made up for this by having what appeared to be half the school clustered around her bed.

He sighed internally. Great. This was just what he needed. He knew that Weasel and Potter would be over protective and borderline aggressive. They would resent his presence. They would say something rude, to his face without actually addressing it to him, and be overly defensive of Hermione. They wouldn't want him there and their prospective partners would back them up.

He just wanted to see his son, why was everyone so against this?

"Zabini." Harry said shortly, standing up as if to put them on an equal level or something.

"What are you doing here?" Weasley said rudely.

"I said he could come." Hermione interrupted the pair of them. She looked well, actually, he'd expected her to look more like she had just given birth just the day before. That was good, it meant his son was well and healthy.

"Why?" The Weasel actually looked shocked. His mouth hung open in a faintly repulsive fashion.

"Yeah Hermione, you sure that's a good idea? You did say you didn't, you know, want to see him?" Harry's wife, Ginny or whatever her name was, said in a worried fashion.

He decided it was time to set everybody straight. "The child is my son and, as such, I would like to visit him."

"Can you leave us, just for a moment?" Hermione interjected. She hadn't made eye contact with him yet but she hadn't told him to leave, in fact she was asking her best friends to go.

"Us?" Ron said blankly.

"Yes." She replied in a slightly firmer tone. "Just for ten minutes."

There was a short pause.

"Okay." Harry said finally. He got up to leave although he didn't look happy about it. "Just call if you need us."

The others all nodded in unison, adding their support. Blaise wanted to laugh at how comical it all was, what on earth did they think he was going to do?

The crib was the other side of the bed so he was unable to see into it. Hermione reached down for a moment, reappearing with the baby tucked neatly into her arms. The baby was wrapped in a huge shawl, all that could be seen of him was a little pink face and one very tiny hand which was gripping, very tightly, to the edge of the shawl.

"He's called Theodore." Hermione said softly. She had this look on her face whenever she looked at her son, loving, soft. He'd never seen her like that before. She looked at him, Blaise, for a moment, her expression considering. Something in his face must have reassured her because she asked him a question. "Did you...d'you want to hold him?"

Blaise nodded. "If I can."

Hermione swung her legs round so she was perched on the edge of the bed all without even jostling Theodore. Carefully, she offered Theodore up to him. Equally as gently, he took him.

"Make sure you support his head." Hermione instructed quietly, adjusting his elbow slightly. Blaise almost jumped at the contact, it was probably the first time she had touched him willingly. Having a baby had changed her; she would do anything, anything at all, if it meant getting the best for her baby. He'd never held a baby before; he hadn't expected him to be so...so warm and alive.

Theodore gazed blindly up at him with big, blue eyes and Blaise blinked once. He definitely had not expected his son to be so alive, so real. He definitely looked like his father, something about his features, although he expected Hermione would have some sort of influence in there as well.

"Perfect, isn't he?" Hermione sounded a little smug, a proud mother. That was good – he was proud as well.

Blaise nodded. "Yes, yeah he is."

**A/N: No, there will still be no happy ending for Blaise and Hermione. However, they have a child together and that fact cannot be ignored. They have to, for the sake of their baby, have some sort of relationship and that is why they are speaking amicably and appear to be getting along. I know he was angry at the beginning (quite understandably, I feel), but I don't think he'd want this to ruin the first time he sees his son.**


	101. Lee and Pansy 5

**A/N: For IceChanter, .Alice, Afrenchgirl, LovelyRoses and random-fruitcake04, a little update on how Lee's doing!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Lee x Pansy

Life's hard. Life's really hard. This life, the one I've chosen, isn't fun, it isn't comfortable, it isn't safe. It's danger and risk and pain and living life on the edge.

I love it.

It's like nothing else I've ever done before. The first weeks were torture. I had to remember vast amounts of information about the organisation and procedures and operations whilst doing hours and hours of physical fitness training. I was pretty much run into the ground by the end of each day, I tell you I've never slept better.

Of course, there were night drills as well so you don't exactly get a full night's interrupted sleep. Well, not very often. And even when you're asleep, you have to be constantly alert, just in case.

Everyone takes turns at night watch, once a week, and when people are working the field, you have to cover for them. One week I did night watch five nights out of the seven. Oh yeah, it's a seven day thing. You can't exactly have your weekends off. I knew that though, when I signed up, I knew it would be all encompassing. It's my life now, just the way it is. I don't have a life outside of this but that's not my fault – the Ministry pushed me into this and I'll do everything I can do push them right back. Everything.

Night drills are the worst. Sixteen mile runs are Merlin awful anyway, doing them at midnight when every muscle in your body aches from the day's exertions and you're so tired you can barely keep your eyes open and it's so damn dark you can't see more than about three centimetres in front of your face, well, that's pretty much the lowest you can get.

Every now and then there'll be a fake raid just to keep everyone on edge and yet another night's sleep goes down the drain. It's practice for if we do actually get discovered. It's hectic and disorientating and usually everyone gets fake captured. For every person that gets captured there is usually some sort of extra work to do, extra drills, extra night duties, that sort of thing. The fake raids are tough.

Hell everything about this life is tough.

It's not torture anymore though. It's my life and I actually enjoy it. Well, sometimes anyway.

The training was by far the toughest part. It was really hard. A lot of it was a bit like training for the Muggle army, only with wands and spells not guns and bombs. There was some magical stuff in there – learning defensive spells, learning how to cope when three people are attacking you and you're backed into a corner, learning how to evade Auror capture. And there was some rote learning as well, facts and figures and important procedures and stuff.

After all that was over and I was qualified, I was set up with a unit. I have no idea how many units there are but I've met around twelve others and I reckon that's not all of them.

Each unit has six people in it. They're stationed around the country, each has a main base and then a few other smaller ones. Each also has a leader who gets orders direct from headquarters. Orders must be carried out.

Units are family. Sometimes the family gets split up – someone gets arrested or deserts. We've never had a deserter in our unit. The members of our unit are focused, driven and determined. I'm glad, proud even, to be a part of this.

Your unit is the only person you can trust in your life, the only people you can rely on, the people who will have your back no matter what. Sure you meet other units, but you can never fully trust them. We shared a base with another unit for one night, no one slept. No one wanted to sleep, just in case. It turned out that they were legit, and obviously we were as well, but you can't let your guard down. They might have been a group of Aurors ready to arrest you the second you relaxed a little.

The real surprise was finding that I knew two of the members of my unit. One was Ernie Macmillan. I don't remember much of him from school but we were both in the DA together. He doesn't speak much. I remember him being a pompous kid, cocky even. The war changed him though. He never talks about who his intended spouse was either leading us to all conclude that she was awful. He's scarred, lost all faith in the Ministry. We found him though, took him under our wing and taught him to fight. Corruption in its' truest form.

The other was Penelope Clearwater, Percy's old girlfriend. I only knew who she was because she was dating Percy. I didn't really know her though; I just assumed she was pretty dull because, you know, she was dating Percy for Merlin's sakes. I tease her about that sometimes, okay all the time, she still insists that he wasn't so bad. She's a good girl though. Tough. Tougher than I thought she'd be. She was engaged to Gregory Goyle, which I reckon is almost as bad as Parkinson. She was in Azkaban during the war, she was a Muggleborn and the Umbridge hag sentenced her. She's been through a lot, it's obvious but she never shows it. She's happy, hard working, one of the guys and yet unmistakeably the mother hen.

She's the only girl in our group. The others are Pete (our leader), Samuel (an ex-Auror) and Rupert Yates, who used to work in the Ministry. In fact, Yates had been one of the very first to join the resistance. He had worked with the Minister, had been one of the very first to learn of the law. He had a long term girlfriend. They hadn't been matched. They'd appealed and everything but his girl had been forced into marriage. Yates had ran, ran before his wedding day, and never looked back.

They were good mates of mine now, we all were friends. You had to be. You couldn't be any other way. We all lived together, shared the same cramped conditions, ate together, slept on the same sheets, spent all day every day together, permanently on the brink of danger. The conditions just drew you together.

I'd only known these people about three months and I already knew them better than I knew people I had considered to be friends in my former life.

I didn't have friends outside my unit, not anymore. It wasn't possible. Sure I would have done anything to see the twins again, they were my best friends, but I couldn't. I knew they wouldn't turn me over to the authorities but if they didn't, they would be harbouring a fugitive and I couldn't do that to them.

Our unit was unusual in one respect. We were stationed in France, the only unit over here. We were running the radio station. We didn't really need six of us to do that – I was the main broadcaster, the others chipped in every now and then, and Penny cast most of the spells necessary to broadcast properly. The others were mostly for defence and safety. When we weren't on air, we were trying to drum up support for our cause in France.

The French Wizarding community were very conscious of class. There was a real upper class and a lower class with no in between. The upper class wanted nothing to do with us, we were too low born, too poor. The lower class didn't care much about our cause, besides they didn't have any real power and couldn't really help us. It was a real impasse. We kept trying though. We had to.

I knew some of the other units worked in other countries as well. Having international support and the backing of foreign governments would add weight and muscle to our cause. It was really the only way to get the law abolished. The Ministry would never cave because of our efforts, we needed other countries to support us and to speak out and publicly condemn Kingsley and his cabinet.

That was the main aim. Get other countries on board. It would take time and effort. There were units working hard all over the world, trying to persuade others to help us. Most were unwilling to help us. Britain was still a big influence and Kingsley was internationally quite popular. We'd never give up though.

Our efforts in Britain itself were limited.

Everyone was married. They were either too attracted to their spouse to join us or had found a way of life which included their spouse as little as possible. They were content, unhappy but content enough with life.

We couldn't show our faces with public demonstrations, rallies or marches. The Aurors would arrest us in seconds.

We weren't terrorists. We weren't going to go around and kill and maim innocent people just to get our message across. We were no Death Eaters.

In Britain, our brothers and sisters limited themselves to distributing leaflets, trying to recruit new members and sending petitions and angry letters to the Ministry.

Running the radio station is good. It's even fun sometimes. It's not that risky – British Aurors have no authority in France (even if they knew where we were – and they don't, we're sure they're out looking for us though). It's productive as well. We all feel like we're actually doing something, like perhaps we might actually be making a difference. It takes up time as well. We spend a lot of our time thinking of what to say in our broadcasts, what to do.

See, that's the flipside. Yes, there are moments of danger. It does feel like you're living your life on the edge and yes, you are always alert just in case.

But there are a lot of moments of utter boredom. We broadcast every day, for around an hour, perhaps longer if we have more to say. The rest of the time is spent doing menial stuff – cleaning, cooking, chatting, guard duties, playing cards, practicing defensive spells. It gets dull.

And, just when you get so bored you want to gouge your eyes out or something, bam, something happens and it's dangerous and you're running into the action, adrenaline pumping, heart thumping, firing of spells left and right and you wonder how you were ever bored because nothing is more exciting, more scary than this.

Like I said, life's hard. But it's also really bloody good.

I've met new people, people I like and trust and respect, people who have fast become my friends. I've learned new things, things that I just do now, I know how to do them so well. I've become a better person, a person who can cope with anything the world throws at him.

Life's good.


	102. Oliver and Alicia 7

**A/N: For thedevilandgod, Merts, forever12 and Afrenchgirl.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Oliver x Alicia

"So, you don't have long left then?" He said randomly one summer evening as they reached the Great Lake.

They were walking around the Hogwarts grounds before going to the bedroom chambers. It felt less...tawdry this way. It made her feel less cheap. And he didn't mind, it brought back good memories to see his old school.

"Long left? What?" She said utterly confused.

Oliver had a habit of only voicing part of his thoughts, leaving the chain of events that led to the final thought and most of the crucial information required to understand him out. It was maddening. She felt like she spent half her time asking him to please repeat what he just said. He found it maddening that she didn't understand. Obviously he thought she should automatically know what he was talking about. The idiot.

"At school." He said in a tone which implied it ought to be obvious.

It was the sort of tone that got her back up. It was the sort of tone which usually made her lash out with some catty remark. It was the sort of tone which often ended up with them arguing.

_Deep breaths, Alicia. Don't rise to it. Just breathe._

She was trying to work on her temper. She gazed into the depths of the lake; the water was almost black despite the remnants of the summer sun still visible in the sky.

"No. Not really. Just over a month." She replied airily, not really getting his point but determined not to say anything mean or stupid.

_That's it Alicia, polite, friendly. Nothing rash. Nothing catty. Nothing sarcastic._

"So...what're you gonna do...afterwards?"

"For a career?" She asked a touch defensively. She was still undecided. She had absolutely no idea what she wanted to do with her life and he had no business bringing that up.

"Well yeah, but that wasn't exactly what I meant." His hand went up automatically to rub the back of his neck. She'd learned, from observation, that he did this whenever he felt awkward or nervous or both.

"Well what did you mean?" She asked, trying very hard to keep the tone light. He really did confuse her sometimes, she never knew what he was thinking, what he was on about. She didn't like feeling clueless and stupid.

"I meant, well what I'm trying to say is...well, erm...where will you live?"

"Oh." She said in surprise. She hadn't really thought about that. She was a little touched that Oliver had thought of it though. That was nice of him. "Well, I'm not really sure. I should probably look for a place or something. I'd always planned on living with Kate but she has to live with Draco and Angie's off with Fred. Guess I'll have to go solo." She chuckled.

She wouldn't mind living alone, sure she had always liked company but she'd be okay. It would be nice not to have to share her space, to have some alone time and, when she was lonely, there would be Katie (who would, truthfully, probably pretty much live with her in an effort to avoid her husband) and Angelina would pop in and the twins would definitely visit and of course Oliver would be around.

It had definitely crept up on her, even now it still surprised her that Oliver Wood was such a huge part of her life. He had been since the second they were married but it was bigger than that now. He was her friend. Yes, their relationship was definitely friendship. Perhaps even more. Sometimes, she would catch him looking at her with something more than friendly appreciation in his eyes. Just sometimes. He'd always look away instantly, if he saw her looking, and it never lasted long. Just quick glances. That was it. Their relationship was complicated. A fiery friendship.

She didn't hate him anymore. Not at all. She rather liked him. And she was definitely attracted to him. Probably just the charms though. Yeah, just the charms.

He chuckled with her, hand still rubbing the back of his neck uncomfortably and she thought he might even be blushing. "Well...you wouldn't have to be solo, you could erm...only if you wanted to of course, it's just it would save money and there's space and it would be easier...well, you could..yeah, moveinwithme." He said the last few words in one hurried breath, his eyes dropping low to avoid hers.

He was embarrassed. It was cute actually. Really cute.

"Yeah, I guess I could." She said lightly. "I hadn't realised it was an option."

He half smiled. "It's traditional, I believe, for a husband and wife to live together."

She giggled, smiling up at him. "I guess it is."

He offered her his arm in a mockingly gallant fashion which broke the almost moment they had almost, definitely not just had. She laughingly took it, acting as if nothing had just happened. It hadn't really happened, she reasoned. They'd just laughed together, agreed to share a house, no biggie.

They continued their slow walk around the Lake. She tried very hard not to notice how muscled his arms were underneath his robes. That would be inappropriate. We're friends. That is it.

Married friends! You're allowed to think he's gorgeous, which he is by the way, completely smouldering, a slightly giggly voice in her head insisted in a breathy tone of voice.

She shut it up very quickly.

She'd never tried to deny the fact that Oliver was hot. He was. Smoking hot. However, she was a mature, grown up woman who was not going to spend her time panting and fantasising over her friend. It was inappropriate and had to stop.

Instead she focused her mind on the impending move. It would be interesting living together. They still had issues not screaming at each other over the course of one hour, what would it be like when they were living together? Sharing the same bathroom, eating together, sharing a...bed?

Merlin. Was she expected to sleep in the same bed as him? She didn't know if she wanted to do that. Sure they were married and therefore bed sharing was perfectly acceptable, expected even. It would be weirder if they had separate rooms. And yet, that would be oddly intimate. Falling asleep together, waking up together, seeing each other first thing in the morning, defenceless and sleepy. Probably too intimate.

A very small part of her, a part she was trying very hard to suppress, was wondering exactly what Oliver Wood looked like in the morning, his brown hair tousled, his chest bare...

Stop. Inappropriate, she reminded herself.

It was definitely an issue they would need to address at some point. Not now though.

The evening was warm, with just a hint of a breeze, the sun setting in a glorious blaze of colour. They were getting along just fine, laughing, chatting. He had expressed concern for her wellbeing, he had offered to let her move in with him. She couldn't ruin it. Not when it was going so well.

And it was going well. It felt kind of right. Like they were actually really married, like they had chosen each other, like they had willingly got married because they loved each other.

They didn't love each other, of course. It was friendship. That was it.

She distracted her rambling, crazy woman thoughts by changing the subject of conversation.

"Where is your house?"

He laughed. "Yeah, you probably do need to know that now. I live in Dorset, near the training grounds. The grounds are out in the country but I live in a town so there's stuff about... you know, so you aren't all alone." He blushed a little, shoving his free hand into his pocket a little self consciously. She was touched again that he was worrying about her welfare; he had been concerned that she would feel lonely. That was sweet. She'd never really seen his sweet side before. She liked it. She liked it a lot.

"What's it like? Your house, I mean." She clarified.

"Well, it's not huge." He sounded apologetic. She smiled to let him know that small was fine with her. "It was two up, two down. You know, tiny thing really. But I had it extended so I've got some more space. There's a lounge and a kitchen and a separate dining room downstairs, the bedroom and bathroom are upstairs. The garden's pretty big too, so there's room to make it even bigger if we want to. Maybe when...well, when those three kids are here we'll need more room." He sounded almost defensive, as if she would laugh at his plans, at his fore planning. She had no intention of doing so. She was astounded at how much thought he had put into this. He was so...responsible. He was being very mature about this, had even made plans.

"That's...that's great." She said, she was unable to quite express what she was feeling and thinking in words. She'd never been much of a forward thinker, letting things just happen and not really bothering to make plans for the future. The way she saw it, things would just happen and she would think about it when the time came.

Oliver seemed to be her opposite in this respect. He had thought about the future and had made plans to ensure it would be a good, comfortable one. It was almost like they...complemented each other. As if his qualities would make up for the ones she didn't possess and vice versa.

"You'll probably want to...sort it out though. It's a bit of a bachelor pad." He chuckled almost to himself.

"How bad?" She said teasingly. She was actually quite serious though. Dark furnishings and a slightly neglected kitchen she could deal with, a bathroom with unidentifiable substances lurking in it and a permanent, permeating odour of cheesy socks was definitely crossing the line.

"Erm...not quite enough cleaning, nothing very personal about and a brand new, never used oven." He grinned.

"You've never used your oven?" She clarified.

"Nope."

"Well how do you eat?" She asked, mystified.

"I make myself breakfast, without the cooker. I have lunch at training and then I either have dinner there, if there's a match on we get a free meal, or I go out or I go to a friend's. Sometimes I even go to my Mam's. I don't starve." He assured her, with a wicked, and yet very charming, grin.

"Why don't you cook at home?" She asked.

"Well...I can't."

That threw her. She had been expecting laziness, perhaps an aversion to home cooked meals, perhaps he found it easier to eat out. She had never before encountered someone who could not cook. Surely everyone could make food. It wasn't hard, was it?

"What d'you mean you can't?" She demanded, a tad astounded.

"I just never learned. Never had any reason to and then I never had the time to and now, I dunno, I don't know where to start."

"Well I guess that'll be my job then." She said. There was a short pause. "But that doesn't mean I'm doing everything like some housewife! Just because I'm living with you, does absolutely not mean that I'm going to do all the chores and cook and clean for you like your little servant!" She finished her mini rant a little defensively. There was no way she would do everything for him just because she lived with him.

"Okay, okay." He said holding his hands up in surrender. "I never said that."

"Yeah, well I was just saying."

"Yeah, well that's okay then." He was teasing her. She felt a momentary surge of hate for him.

"Good." She said angrily.

"Great." He retorted.

He was smirking. Irritating. He was smirking down at her, emphasising the height difference. Patronising. She wanted to make him stop teasing her, stop laughing at her, stop that stupid smirking! And so, she did the only thing she could think of.

She reached up, grabbed the front of his shirt and pulled him to her, kissing him forcefully. He responded instantly, his hands gripping her hips almost painfully tight and somehow not tight enough.

They broke apart, breathing quickened, eyes brightened.

"Glad that's settled then." He smirked again.

"Prat."

**IMPORTANT: To all my readers, I'm will be on holiday from the 2****nd**** of August until the 16****th**** and so will not be updating at all during that time – I just thought I'd let you all know so you didn't think I'd abandoned you all! I'll try and update as soon as possible when I get back. To make up for it, here's the second chapter of the day. **

**Please keep reading, reviewing and requesting and I'll be back very soon!**


	103. Draco and Katie 11

**A/N: Hey guys – I am now back from my holidays. I did some writing whilst I was away so I've got a few chapters ready to post! **

**For Bergere, missb14, Lord Basileus, forever12, Rueflowersmall and delicate and Moldyshorts.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter**

Draco x Katie

She swore once. It didn't make her feel any better so she swore again, a little louder this time. It had no effect. Things were exactly the same as they had been beforehand. She slumped down to the floor, leaning against the locked door. She didn't want Narcissa or Draco to intrude so she'd locked it physically and then enhanced it with magical wards. That would probably attract attention if either one of them came to find her or tried to open the door but she didn't care. She couldn't have either of them walking in. She needed to be alone for this.

Katie became aware that her breathing was erratic and short, almost panting. Not good. She wasn't getting enough oxygen and pretty soon her body would realise that and start protesting.

_C'mon Katie, breathe. _

In and out. In. Out. She spent what felt like hours, but was probably more like ten minutes, concentrating solely on breathing in and out. In. Out.

When she was finally sure that her breathing was under control and that her brain was getting all the oxygen it required, she pulled her knees up towards her chest and rested her arms on top. She settled her chin down comfortably and closed her eyes.

She needed to think now. Rationally.

She was pregnant. The baby was, obviously, Draco's. Narcissa was going to be thrilled. She'd probably scream she'd be so excited (well, obviously she wouldn't scream – she might, however, crack a smile or something). She was desperate for a grandchild. She was practically knitting booties and creating a nursery already. From Draco himself she was anticipating a lukewarm response. Draco wanted an heir, not a child. He would probably have little to do with the baby.

The baby would be her responsibility, in Draco's mind anyway. Narcissa would probably want to have some part in raising the baby – it wasn't as if she had anything else to occupy her time other than shopping and coffee mornings. That might be quite useful, when Narcissa was looking after the baby she, Katie, would be able to rest and to do other things. Narcissa would be a good grandmother.

Draco would have a mild interest in the baby. Perhaps he might hold him or her during the evenings for a while, bring the baby out to show people, to impress on his clients the idea that he was a family man. When the child was older, he would probably have a little more interest in it.

Narcissa had told her that every single firstborn Malfoy child was a boy. Girls came later, if ever. She was personally hoping to have a girl. Just to spite the Malfoys really, rather than any specific desire to produce a female child.

Narcissa had also told her that Malfoy babies were big babies. Always. That she was a little worried about.

She had been expecting this. Well, she had but she hadn't. She'd known it would happen just not when it would happen. She'd been hoping for a little more time really. Time was good.

She'd just about settled into a routine here. She was managing. Her and Draco spent very little time together, often she didn't see him all day until they ate dinner together in the evenings. Narcissa left her alone for long periods of time. She might have been insulted if she hadn't hated spending any time with her mother in law. Apparently that was quite natural, the hating of the mother in law thing. Narcissa wasn't that bad though. She was just so perfect, so Pureblood. She was a perfect Pureblood wife in every way and she expected Katie to be the same. Only Katie didn't want that. She didn't even think that Draco wanted that. Draco's father's generation probably wanted a wife with doll like proportions, who followed every rule of decorum going and who would speak only when spoken to.

Draco, however, didn't seem to mind if she wore jeans instead of dresses or that she liked to eat more than three mouthfuls at mealtimes or that she had things to say and quite regularly said them. He seemed to actually prefer it when she argued with him or disagreed with something he said.

Like she said, she'd settled into life here. It was a comfortable life, that much could not be denied. It was often boring though. She spent her days reading and exploring. She had accidentally stumbled across the entrance to the lofts and, very tentatively at first, had begun looking through. There were some very suspicious objects up there, dark stuff, she didn't touch that. The attic was actually a series of rooms. She'd looked at each but her favourite was one which contained nothing but old trunks. She'd been through them and found a load of old clothes, old fashioned stuff. Very beautiful though. She'd taken a silk shawl for herself, reasoning that it wouldn't be missed and that Narcissa hadn't seemed to realise that she might get chilly in the gowns and dresses she was supposed to wear. Narcissa hadn't even seemed to notice the little addition to her wardrobe.

Her life would certainly be different now she was having a baby. For a start, Narcissa would definitely want her to have virtual bed rest. That wasn't happening. She might accept lying down in the afternoons, particularly if it enabled her to dine alone in her room (and therefore meant even less time spent with Narcissa and Draco), but she was now spending all day in bed. She'd go stir crazy. As it was, being pregnant would severely restrict her life. There was no way Narcissa would take her anywhere now, for Pureblooded women pregnancy seemed to be something that you hid. You announced you were pregnant, disappeared for nine months and appeared again with a newborn baby in your arms (or, more accurately, the nanny's arms). It wasn't as if Narcissa took her out regularly but every now and then she would insist on a shopping trip, which Katie was beginning to enjoy, coffee mornings or brunches were more boring but bearable, just. At least they got her out the house. She still visited the twins and Angie and Luna regularly. Alicia was moving in with Oliver so she'd be able to visit her soon, when she finished Hogwarts. She liked being able to see her friends, visiting them were the highlights of her week. Narcissa would not take that away from her by insisting on bed rest.

Many people, particularly the older generation, still believed the old witches' tale that Apparating when pregnant was dangerous for the baby. It wasn't. It was advised not to Apparate during the final month of pregnancy, although it was acceptable in emergencies (such as when you were giving birth, for example), but Healers assured that it was safe. She needed some back up on that, perhaps an article on it, something to show Narcissa in case she tried to say it wasn't safe or something.

Katie peeled herself off of the floor. It was about ten minutes until dinner, time to break the news. It was customary to inform the father first, she thought.

Where would Draco be? In his study, obviously. She'd never been there before because in doing so she would be actively seeking him out and she'd never done that before. This was a definite one off.

She knew where it was located though. He had shown it to her one day, probably when she first moved in or something. She hadn't been in, he'd just pointed out the door.

She checked her reflection in the bathroom mirror. She looked a little pale but still fine, actually she looked almost as pale as Draco and Narcissa did, it was a creepy thought – she didn't want to be like them. Next, she opened the door, removing the magical wards and stepped out. She made her way quickly to Draco's study. She wanted to tell him first, alone, and if she didn't hurry there was a chance he would already be on his way to dinner before she found him.

She reached the door and hesitated. Did she knock?

She didn't have time to reach a conclusion as the door swung open and Draco appeared in the doorway.

The shock of seeing her there was evident on his face for a second or two before he schooled his expression into the customary smirk. "Kate, what a surprise."

"I need to tell you something." She said quietly.

He nodded once. "Of course, come in." He held the door open for her. "Let's sit here." He gestured to two armchairs in one corner.

The room was large with lots of windows and not much furniture. There was a desk and a chair in the middle, a rug on the floor, these two chairs and a cabinet on the wall. It didn't seem like Draco's sort of room. She thought he preferred grander furniture, a room that made a statement. Perhaps it wasn't originally his. It made her skin crawl to imagine that his father might have once owned this room, had been in here, had sat in this very chair.

"What's the matter, love?" He asked. He seemed concerned. She wasn't surprised – she'd never actively sought him out before, he was probably expecting the worst.

"I'm pregnant." She blurted the words out, her gaze fixed firmly on her hands. There was a minute's silence, she chanced a look up, to try and see what he was thinking.

"This is fantastic, absolutely brilliant." He said happily. He was smiling, really smiling, not that awful smirk he so commonly wore. He had quite a nice smile, she noted.

She managed a half smile.

"You don't look so pleased, Kate."

"I'm fine." She responded automatically.

He reached one hand out to touch hers, just for a moment. She didn't pull away and he left it there a moment longer. The attraction charms made him want to touch her all the time, not in that way, well not all the time at least, just the merest hint of physical contact was enough. He wondered if it were the same for her. Probably not. She didn't even like him.

"Kate." He ducked his head a little to meet her eyes. "What's wrong?"

She bit her lip, her thoughts were jumping about all over the place and she couldn't quite gather them up neatly. "I don't know. I mean, I just don't get it. I'm supposed to be happy and I am but then I shouldn't be happy because I didn't want this, I don 't, I didn't...well, whichever, this is not how things were supposed to be. I mean, I wanted to live. To get out. I'm stuck here, with you and your mum, and it's stifling and boring and this baby, our baby, won't change things. It won't at all. I'm not happy, I shouldn't be happy, I'm carrying your baby, a Malfoy heir. He'll be the grandson of Death Eater, Merlin even his father would have been a Death Eater. How can I carry a baby like this? Everything's just completely wrong and yet, I feel happy. Happy because I'm having a baby and I always did want a family and there's this other happiness and I just don't get it. I mean, can I really be happy that it's your child?"

She hadn't really meant to voice her inner jumble of thoughts and feelings but when she had started she had just continued and been unable to stop. She felt better now she'd spoken but wondered if she'd been too...personal. She'd confided in him here. Maybe she'd said something she shouldn't have.

"I didn't know." He replied quietly after what felt like an age.

"About what?" She said a touch petulantly. She was embarrassed and lashing out to try and hide this. Embarrassment made you vulnerable and she never wanted to be compromised in front of him.

"Any of it." He said honestly. "I didn't realise you hated it quite so much here. I know it's not ideal but...I really do like having you here, Kate. And Mother does as well, she's always felt a little isolated being the only female in the house. We can try and find you things to do, something to fill your time. You can come to me whenever you want to, if you have a request or a problem or if you just want to talk. I know it wasn't by choice but I am your husband and I'll try my best to live up to all that that role entails. If you'll let me, that is."

He took a deep breath. "I doubt it'll be of much comfort but I never chose the Death Eater route. It was the only one I had and I took it. It was that or death. Perhaps I'm a coward because I chose not to die, but I no one wants to die. I wanted to live and I did things I shouldn't have done, things I didn't want to do, in order to do so. I regret everything I did in the war, everything." He looked shaken as he spoke, ashen almost, she wondered if he was relieving some of the things he had seen and done in the war. Instinctively, she moved a fraction closer to him and rested her hand on his arm. He seemed to relax a little under her touch.

He continued. "I am thrilled you're having a baby, our baby. I can't wait. I know you think I just want an heir, I do of course, but it's more than that. I want our child as well. I know you're not entirely happy about it but I really am glad, and Mother will be too, and I hope in time you can grow to be as happy as I am now."

He seemed embarrassed by his words. Two pink spots had appeared on his cheeks. Kate found it sort of endearing. She'd been worried that he would laugh at her thoughts, or perhaps close off emotionally. He hadn't. He'd responded, opened his heart to her and she felt as if perhaps they could move on now, develop a friendship even.

He fumbled for a long moment. "Erm...well, we should go to dinner. Tell Mother the news."

He rose to his feet, all sense of awkwardness dissipating, and offered her his hand. She took it, surprising both herself and him, and, further shocking both of them, threw her arms around him. He seemed so stunned it took him a second or two to respond and wrap his arms around her waist.

"I am happy we're having a baby." She whispered against his shoulder. She didn't know if he heard or not.

It felt kind of nice having him hold her.

The errant thought shocked her so much she pulled away a little and he released his hold on her. Then both red faced and studiously avoiding eye contact they made their way down to dinner to inform Narcissa of the happy news.


	104. Ron and Padma 7

**A/N: For forever12, Mint and lemon and Fernsong. **

**I also wanted to thank you all for the very enthusiastic response to the last chapter. Some of you seemed to think I had given up on this story – I promise you I'm not giving up on this, I'm seeing it right through to the end (which, sadly, isn't that far away!). Thank you again for all the reviews and please do keep the requests coming in for your favourite couple.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Ron x Padma

Although Parvati and Padma were twins, people could always tell them apart. They always had been able to, ever since birth. They weren't supposed to be able to – they were identical, for Merlin's sake. Padma thought it was because they were so crucially different. Twins often had shared interests and habits and friends. She and Parvati couldn't be more different. They had virtually nothing in common apart from perhaps their blood and looks. Physically, they were the same. In every other way possible they were separate.

In this respect, as with every other, they were again different. Parvati had been thinking of baby names ever since she was a little girl. When they were younger, Parvati's favourite game had been Mummies and Daddies (Padma had always preferred Dressing Up or Making Collages). Parvati had planned out the order in which she would have her children, the age gap between them and the names each would have complete with back up names just in case for some reason one name couldn't be used. Her plans had altered slightly, and only slightly, when Seamus came into the picture to encompass a few Irish based names.

Padma, however, had barely given motherhood a second thought. She knew she would have children one day. That was about as far as she had got. Ron was the same. He hadn't really thought about it. Neither of them had thought about how many or names or anything like that. They hadn't gone into specifics or details.

She was six months pregnant now though and it was probably time she at least considered names to give her children.

Parvati had lent her a big book filled to the brim with names. It made her head spin just flicking through it. Lists and lists and lists of names. She didn't even know where to begin. Parvati had just chosen a shortlist and then narrowed them down and down and down, thrashing out the final choices with Seamus. The whole affair had been conducted with military precision.

Padma wasn't sure what to do. She hadn't considered names. Names were important though, they could shape a whole person. What if she chose wrong?

Ron, sitting beside her on the worn sofa, looked over. "What's wrong?"

"I can't even begin to decide." She said, dropping the book to the floor in exasperation. "What if we get it wrong?" Pregnancy hormones were definitely getting the better of her because she felt an urge to cry. Ron didn't like tears though, they made him awkward and uncomfortable, so she tried to hold them in for his sake.

"Well, let me help you then." He said, picking the book up and moving closer. "Well, for a start we can't have anything that a member of my family already has. We also can narrow it down because we can't have anything anyone else has already got – like Theodore. And I prefer more traditional names."

She nodded. "Me too." Her voice sounded a little pitiful.

He subconsciously moved one hand so it was resting lightly on her stomach, the other flicking through the huge book of names.

"How about I say a few I like and if you like them as well, well then we're halfway there." He said decisively.

She nodded.

"Rachel?"

"No."

"Why not?" He asked.

She just shook her head firmly.

He sighed, muttered something under his breath, and returned to the book.

Her laissez faire attitude to motherhood concerned her somewhat. She was supposed to be a Ravenclaw – studious, dependable. She hadn't put any foresight or planning into this whatsoever. Perhaps that was alright though; you probably couldn't plan things like this out, not really. Even Parvati's plans had been altered as Seamus' had wanted some input, of course.

"What about Rebecca?" Ron said, thumbing through the book.

Padma thought for a moment. "Maybe."

There was a moment's silence. Ron continued to scan through the endless lists of names. He stopped suddenly. "Rose. For a girl."

He sounded so sure, so decisive.

Padma smiled to herself. "Rose. Yes, that's just right."

Her little Rose Weasley – red haired and pale skinned like all Weasleys were but perhaps with brown eyes, like her mother. She would be bright and funny, beautiful of course, and a Gryffindor to boot.

Ron looked relieved. "Okay, now let's look at boy's names."

"Wait – aren't we supposed to have a few of each...just in case?" Padma asked worriedly.

"Only if you're unsure about the name. I think we're pretty sure, aren't we. We know that our daughter should be called Rose. Our first daughter anyway, we might end up having two. Or three." He added as an afterthought.

Padma grinned. "Four girls in the house. You'd be outnumbered."

Ron wrinkled his nose slightly. "It wouldn't be great; you'd all gang up on me." He also suspected that he would be rather henpecked therefore making him the butt of all family jokes. He also had a feeling that they would have him wrapped around their fingers completely from the very first time he saw them. They'd probably walk all over him. And he'd let them.

Padma nodded knowledgably. "Probably."

"Anyway, boys names..." Ron turned to the later section of the book. There were endless lists of boys' names. This would be more difficult. His family were naturally inclined towards the male side, so many names had already been taken. He wanted his children to have unique names, they didn't need to try and live up to anything.

"James?" He suggested.

Padma stared at him as if he were stupid.

"What?" He said self consciously.

"Harry's father was called James so obviously that's their name. Obviously, their first boy will be James. And they'll have Lily as well. And Sirius and I guess maybe even Remus." She spoke in a tone which implied it should be obvious.

Ron inwardly cursed his own stupidity. How had he forgotten something as basic as that? "Yeah, I completely forgot. You're absolutely right." As usual. Padma was a lot like Hermione in this respect – they were always right. Always.

He continued flicking through the book, which actually referred to itself as a 'bible' – yep, 'The Complete Baby Name Bible'. The slogan stated, in a perky upbeat tone, 'Thousands of names for your new arrival whether it's a boy or a girl – we'll have the perfect name!' If only he could find that elusive perfect name. He hadn't even realised there were so many names out there. How could he ever choose one out of this lot? He knew he wanted something traditional and quite normal. He wasn't a fan of unusual names, it was much better to go with something simple and normal.

But how did you ever choose a name, how could you decide what your child would be called every day for the rest of their lives, how they would identify themselves forever, without even seeing them or knowing them. Perhaps he would feel more equipped to choose if they waited a few years until their kid was older, until it had a real established personality and he knew what it looked like and what it would be like. Then they might be able to choose better and find something that really fitted.

Although, perhaps it worked the other way and the name the child was given shaped it, rather than them shaping the name. Would he be a different person if he wasn't called Ronald Bilius Weasley?

Possibly. Possibly not. He'd never know.

He mentally ran through a list of possible names.

Thomas. Samuel. Jonathan. Ethan. Jack.

Maybe they should just work from those five and choose their favourite. Padma probably wouldn't like that method though. And they might be missing out on the perfect name just because he hadn't wanted to look properly.

He could suggest those five though to see what Padma thought of them.

"How about Thomas? Or Ethan?"

"I prefer Thomas."

"Me too." He said, relieved. Maybe this was it. Had they found the right name now?

"What else?" She said, a fraction impatiently.

Ron stifled a smile and continued. "Samuel?" Pregnancy hormones were playing havoc with his darling wife's emotions. She burst into tears at the drop of a hat and then, about three seconds later, would be suddenly very angry at some perceived slight against her. This whole experience had definitely taught him some tact. He had learned, from experience, that you never kept a pregnant woman waiting, to always have a tissue handy just in case of tears and that when Padma was screaming, it was best to be out of hexing range.

"No."

He didn't even bother to ask. Obviously she had some prejudice against the name and he wasn't going to argue with the pregnant lady. Definitely not. That would be very dangerous.

"I like the name Jack then." He ventured.

She paused, he could see her mouthing the names. _Ron, Padma, Rose and Jack. _And, of course, their third child. They could think of names nearer the time though. He was already exhausted and they'd only been at this about fifteen minutes.

"Jack is good." She said finally and he just about managed to stifle his sigh of relief. "Yes, Rose and Jack, our two babies."

"We'll leave it at that then, shall we? We can think of a replacement name when the second baby is due and then again when we have our third child."

She nodded. "Definitely. Maybe we'll be better at this then, when we've had a bit of experience."

Ron nodded hastily. "Definitely."


	105. Neville and Hannah 7

**A/N: For MidnightIsCalling and tamara72.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Neville x Hannah

It had been a long time since he had felt anything much. Days passed in a daze. He knew he was worrying Hannah but he didn't know how to make himself feel again. What frightened him the most was that he couldn't even feel anything for Hannah, for his wife. She was a stranger to him. A stranger who moved about the house quietly and spoke to him in a soft, soft voice as if she didn't want to disturb him and wore a permanent worried expression. She was still his Hannah, he just didn't know what that entailed anymore.

She'd appealed to him so many times, trying to persuade him to get better, to get some help, to come back. She'd tried in that soft, soft voice and, later when nothing she said made any difference, in harsher tones, worried tones, she snapped at him tension lacing her every word.

He was lost. Gone from this world. Lost in a haze of grief and sadness and mourning. He wasn't sure how to get out of it, not really. He was trying, some days he'd almost clear his head and he'd think yes, this is it, time to get up, time to live again and then all of a sudden, he'd slip right back, sink down into the fog and he couldn't even contemplate even trying to get out. It was easy here. Easy to sink away into the nothingness, he couldn't feel any pain or sorrow or hurt there. It was easy.

Deep down, he knew it wasn't healthy though or normal. He should feel something. Logically, the pain would fade eventually. He just had to work through it until it reached a manageable level. The pain would subside gradually until he was able to look back and smile at what was, rather than wanting to cry and scream and rage at how unfair it all was.

It was almost as if he needed something to shock him back into awareness, back into feeling, back into life. He just wasn't sure what. Something big and life changing. It needed to be something that would force him to sit up and take responsibility. Marriage would have been a good option but he'd already done that. He wasn't sure what was left, maybe a good job offer. He fancied a new job. Something still Herbology based, he loved working with plants, caring for them was what he was meant to do he was sure of it, but he didn't like the commercial greenhouses as much anymore.

At first they had entranced him with the sheer size and magnitude of them, all those plants, all different shapes and sizes and habits. It was like his very own personal oasis.

But soon the tide had turned. The commercial greenhouses existed solely to make money. They sold the plants – or parts of them – on to potion makers or potion ingredient shops. It was good business, not many greenhouses existed and demand regularly outstripped demand. It just felt a bit...soulless. As if the plants didn't matter. Who cared if a few died or if they were unhappy or undersized or weren't being cared for properly, they were making a big profit anyway. Who cared if the Venomous Tentacular bit someone and they were poisoned, they could be paid off, they had the money.

It was good work but it wasn't exactly meaningful. He wanted to do something that meant something, that made a difference.

He was still musing this and future career plans when Hannah approached him. She was cautious, like a dormouse he noted. She was wary of him, tentative, as if he were likely to break down at any moment. Didn't she get it? He'd already had the breakdown. He was just waiting to be restarted. He wasn't going to explode; he needed to be jump started back to life.

"I need to talk to you." She said firmly.

He wondered idly when and where she had found her new confidence. Or perhaps it had always been there, just lying dormant under the surface and it had taken something like this to bring it to the forefront. He wasn't sure if he liked it or not. He'd always been the strong one and being so weak, so lifeless, so like this, made him feel uneasy. He wasn't taking care of her like he was supposed to. She was supposed to be able to lean on him and she couldn't, not when he needed her so desperately right now. The role reversal unsettled him, made him feel redundant and useless.

"Okay." He managed. His voice cracked from lack of use.

She paused. She bit her lip gently. It was a nervous habit of hers. He reached out, very slowly and carefully, to touch her hand. It was a gesture of comfort. It seemed to help her out some because she half smiled and patted his hand gently and continued. "I'm pregnant."

That was it. The jumpstart. The spark. The life changing news to bring him back to life.

He was going to be a father, a dad. He would have a child, his child and Hannah's child. A child who was dependant on him and on Hannah. A child who would need a father, a father like he had never had. A child who would need a proper father not a weak, lifeless, empty shell where a person used to be.

His own father, and mother, had been like that, through no fault of their own. This coma, almost, or whatever it was, the haze was self induced. He knew what it was like to be essentially an orphan. He wouldn't wish it on anyone. He would do anything to ensure that his child never had to go through that. That meant waking up.

It was time to wake up.

Hannah was obviously waiting for some sort of response and the longer his silence continued, the more worried she looked. He wondered, just for a moment, what his face looked like. Whatever expression it wore, it was evidently of no comfort to his wife.

"That's...that's...wow." He finished lamely.

Hannah blinked. "That's it?"

No, he wanted to say, no of course that's not it. I'm thrilled, ecstatic, jumping for joy. I just don't know how to say it or whether to say it.

"No. No. I'm...I just... I don't know what to say." He said quietly. He wasn't sure how to express joy, not anymore. This feeling inside him, the fluttering smiley warm feeling, it was definitely joy. He wasn't so far gone that he didn't recognise emotion. He just didn't know how to act on it. How did he show it?

"Are you at least pleased?" She demanded angrily. Deep frown lines had appeared in her forehead and her cheeks had pinked a little.

"Yes." He said honestly. "I really am. Truly."

This seemed to pacify his wife somewhat. She relaxed, just a fraction. Some of the anger dissipated from her face. Before he saw the anger go, he hadn't even noticed exactly how much anger there was in her face. Tired, bitter, raging anger. Had he done this to her?

He wasn't sure what to do next. He wanted to reach out and hold her, hold her until she relaxed properly and then he could tell her just how thrilled he was, how excited he was that he was about to be a father.

A long time ago he could have done that. Back when they were still at Hogwarts, he could hold her then, when she broke down in tears, shaking and sobbing, he was allowed to hold her then. And when they were first together, after the war, when they were blissfully happy and so filled with joy at even the mention of the other, he could hold her then, just because he felt like it and she would respond instantly. And when they were newlyweds, completely head over heels in love and forging a new life for themselves, he could hold her then because she was his wife and they loved each other.

Now, he wasn't sure if it was allowed.

She didn't instigate physical contact, they complied with the law of course, but she didn't hug him or hold his hands or kiss him like she used to. He wasn't sure that she wanted to be touched anymore. He wasn't even sure what their marriage was anymore, was it a marriage? Would she still be with him, if she didn't legally have to be?

While he had been away, locked deep in the haze of nothing, he realised that their relationship had deteriorated. He was leaning heavily on Hannah and yet, in a way, not leaning on her at all. He hadn't spoken to her or confided in her what he was thinking or feeling at any point. She had been forced to carry on – working to bring in the only money they had, trying to hold him together and help him as best she could as well as all the usual domestic chores. He realised how selfish his breakdown had been. It had been necessary but it had caused so much damage. To him, to Hannah, to their marriage.

It would take work to build them back up to where they were. For him, it was doable. He still loved Hannah, loved her so very much, and he wanted so badly to make her happy. He didn't know what she was thinking though. What if she didn't feel the same? Perhaps it had been altogether too much for her, she wasn't the strong one, she was the one who leaned not the supporter. She had been forced to play a role that she hated – and perhaps even resented.

He had an urge to speak, to break the silence, to convey his thoughts to her. He hadn't had an urge like this in a long while, he only spoke when he absolutely had to, it was so sudden and so strong he went with it.

"Hannah. I'm...I'm sorry. I know it hasn't been easy for you. I've not exactly been...well, I haven't been anything for a long while. I just didn't know how to be again, nothing felt right. It still doesn't, not always. I'm trying so hard to get back to normal. To how it was before. I'm getting there. Slowly. It's slow, really slow. Some days I think I'm better and I want to get up and go out and I try, I really try, and it's all too much and I have to sit back down because it's frightening out there and because it hurts so much that I just can't cope. But I am trying, to cope, I mean. I know it's been hard on you, I'm so grateful that you let me...well, that you let me be like this and you coped so well, I could never have been as strong as you were, as you have been. I think it's time to get up now though. It's time. I've been waiting too long. I think...I think it's going to be really hard, getting up, getting back to normal. I'm trying though. I'm determined to get up, I have to. Our baby can't live with this, like this. I need to get up for his or her sake. And for you, because I love you Hannah. I love you a lot. And I think it's time I started acting like it because you deserve better. Our baby deserved better. I think I have to get up."

He finished his uncharacteristic monologue with a faint flush in his cheeks and a new found sense of purpose. He was a little embarrassed at all he had said and how quickly he had said it all. It had been personal, but Hannah was his wife, they were supposed to confide in each other like this. He hadn't in a long while though, perhaps he hadn't ever. It felt nice though letting it all out, letting her know where he stood and what he was thinking. He felt rejuvenated as well as if he perhaps could get up and go out and get his life back.

Hannah looked shell shocked. She hadn't been expecting this. He noticed that one hand had crept protectively over her flat stomach. It must have been subconscious for she didn't even glance at her hand.

She sighed once and closed her eyes for a second, pinching the bridge of her nose for a moment. She looked tired, he noted, shattered even. "It was time last month, Neville, when we had this same conversation and you promised me you would try and get up. It was time even before then. I'm tired of waiting for you, you need to come back to me or stay away for good. I can't go on like this. I've reached the limit. I'm tired now, I'm going to bed."

She rose abruptly to her feet and walked out leaving Neville sitting all alone, wondering where things had gone wrong, deep down knowing that it was he who had made things wrong, and wondering if he would ever be able to make them right again.


	106. Seamus and Parvati 6

**A/N: For Rueflowersmall and delicate. They're obviously not the most requested couple but in order for this to make sense and follow chronological order this chapter had to be the next one.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Seamus x Parvati

They say that as one chapter ends, another begins.

This chapter was ending.

Today was the very last day of the school year. Their final year at Hogwarts, at the beloved castle, had drawn to a close. Their education was done and dusted. It was time to go out into the real world.

Unlike many other students, Parvati wasn't scared about leaving. Being afraid was about fear of the unknown and she knew exactly where her life was going. She was married and pregnant, she and Seamus owned a house already and they were eager to begin the next phase of their lives.

She was, however, upset to be leaving Hogwarts behind. The castle had been her home for many years now and she wasn't quite ready to let it go. How could she? She had loved, kissed, hugged, studied, screamed, cried, giggled, gossiped, ran, flew, jumped, fought, skipped, befriended, smiled, laughed, slept, ate, lived within these walls for eight years now. How could she ever let go of this place? Hogwarts was home for many. It had been home for her.

Now, though, home was different. Home was the little house she owned with Seamus, the house she would live in and make her own and raise a family in. That would be home.

She felt as if she were in transition, stuck between homes, between phases of her life.

Professor McGonagall was holding a special graduating ceremony. She had insisted upon it. It was only right, she had said, this class had been through so much, they needed a celebration. It would be something good to look back on when they'd left Hogwarts and would, hopefully, override some of the more awful memories they had of this place.

They were all gathered in the grounds, a little like they had been for Professor Dumbledore's funeral (which was a rather grim thought and one which Parvati tried instantly to put out of her mind), on small chairs. It was students only and restricted to their year group only. Some of the former students who had been part of this year group but had chosen not to stay on for a final year were present as well – she had seen Draco Malfoy striding about as if he owned the place and Hermione Granger, Zabini now, celebrating with Harry and Ron.

She sensed that the ceremony was about to begin. Everyone took their seats. Seamus was to her left, Lavender to her right, Dean beside Lavender. She squeezed Lavender's hand quickly and they exchanged wide grins. Seamus' arm was resting on the back of her chair, the hand lightly touching her shoulder. She wondered how long this would take, she was eight months pregnant and it was hot out here and sitting wasn't exactly easy these days – in fact, reclining was about the only way she could be comfortable. She felt just about ready to burst.

No one ever warned you how awful pregnancy could be. In the first few months, she had been a real earth mother, the blossoming type. She had floated about in her specially adapted robes, her hair and skin glorious, her stomach gently swollen. Now she was permanently hot, so huge she couldn't even see her ankles (although she just knew they had swollen to elephant like proportions, she was utterly horrified about the fact, and faintly glad she couldn't see them), suffered from terrible back aches and was highly prone to emotional outbursts.

The professors were seated at the front, facing the students. McGonagall rose and made her way, in a rather stately fashion, to a podium.

"Students, we have gathered here to commemorate the end of an era. Today is the last day of your education. It is a time for celebration, a time for companionship and a time for remembrance. As you go forwards into a new time, into adulthood, I ask you to look back and remember your school years, hopefully you will have fond memories of Hogwarts and you will carry these with you for the rest of your lives. You have been quite unlike any other year group in the challenges you have faced and the admirable way in which you have risen to meet these challenges. I speak on behalf of all the staff gathered here today to say that as a whole we are incredibly proud of you and say that you are, without a doubt, one of the best classes we have ever seen. You have seen through a terrible war, and fought valiantly to save our world; you have suffered the indignities of the marriage law, and adapted to make your lives better and to love your spouses, you have lost your first headmaster, perhaps the greatest man this world has ever known, and kept going just as he would have wanted you to. You are the future and I expect big, bright things from all of you. With you in charge, I have complete and utter faith in a new future, a better future. I feel honoured to have been your teacher. Thank you."

As McGonagall finished, the assembled students burst into applause, many of them with tears in their eyes. Many of the staff had actually risen to applaud the students. McGonagall herself looked a little watery around the eyes.

Parvati shifted a little in her seat. She was uncomfortable. Really uncomfortable. The twins were moving around an awful lot, more than usual. She wished they would just lie still so she could concentrate on the speeches.

Hermione, who had aced her exams despite not even being in the castle and even though she had been dealing with being a new mother, had been elected to give a speech.

She looked tired and a little pale, Parvati noted, but she was smiling. "I won't deny that this has been a difficult two years. However, I'd rather not dwell on the past. Today is all about the future and what we are going to do with it. The future is ours. It's our decision about what we do with it, both with the wider future and with our own individual futures. For many of us our initial ideas about the future will have been changed, maybe because of outside factors or maybe because we have changed ourselves, however we're gathered here today to look forward into the future. It's our future to shape. We can make the world into whatever we want it to be. The future is ours. Let's remember that as we celebrate the end of this era another one is just beginning."

There was more applause and Hermione took her seat between Ron and Harry, flushed pink with pleasure.

Parvati shifted a little more. She was sweating in the midday heat. Although, surely she couldn't be sweating that much - it felt like she was sitting in a puddle of water. She looked down, Seamus saw her move and followed her line of gaze. Her robes were drenched. They exchanged horrified looks and just suddenly, her first contraction hit her.

"I'm-"

"You're-"

Both began talking and then paused to let the other go first.

"You're going into labour." Lavender interrupted. "Now, you need to get to hospital." She spoke in a brisk, matter of fact tone. Parvati vaguely recalled that Lavender had wanted to be a Mediwitch. She'd be good at it.

Lavender stood up interrupting the applause. "Sorry everyone but Parvati's gone into labour so we have to go now."

Everyone fell silent turning, in exact unison, to stare at Parvati. Parvati wished the floor would open up and swallow her whole.

Everything else passed in a blur of activity and endless contractions which she screamed and groaned her way through. Seamus and Lavender pushed their way through the crowds, escorting her, Dean trailing behind a little uselessly. Madame Pomfrey appeared out of nowhere and took them to St Mungo's. It was a little like something from a bad movie as all five of them burst into the lobby, insisting that she was giving birth and needed some help, immediately.

A cool, calm and collected Mediwitch ushered them into a little room. It was starkly white with very little furniture. Madame Pomfrey said she'd wait outside.

Dean clasped her shoulder. "I'm going to step outside, Par. Take care, okay. That's my godchildren in there." He pointed at her huge stomach.

"I'll give it my best shot." She said through gritted teeth. He kissed her cheek and left. Nothing ever seemed to faze Dean.

Seamus and Lavender took up position one either side, holding a hand each.

Padma appeared at one point, kissed her cheeks and told her she'd owl-ed their parents. She went again. She wasn't allowed to stay, the Mediwitch had insisted on only two visitors and Parvati had already filled her quota. Padma had promised to stay right outside.

Childbirth was like nothing else she had ever experienced in her whole life. She'd suffered the Cruciatus Curse. This was quite possibly worse.

Pain. Pain so terrible it blurred her vision, made her head ache and throb so terribly she couldn't even concentrate on anything, she could vaguely hear noises around her but she couldn't focus enough to really hear. The only thing keeping her grounded was Seamus' hand in hers and Lavender gripping tightly the other side. She felt like she was a balloon ready to float away and burst and they were keeping her tethered.

Pain.

Every muscle in her body ached. Every limb throbbed uncomfortably. Everything hurt. Everything. How did anyone endure this? How? She begged for release, for pain relief potion. Finally, just when she thought she was going to actually die, they brought her a potion. As she drunk, the pain receded a little. Enough to clear her head and open her eyes and breathe. She was boiling, sweat dripping from every pore, her hair clinging uncomfortably to the back of her neck.

The potion was a miracle. Life saving.

She wanted to sleep. Sleep and sleep and sleep. Sleep until the pain was gone and until she could sleep no more. Everything would be better when she was asleep. But she couldn't. She had to stay awake. Her girls were depending on her and she had to deliver them safely. Plenty of time for sleeping afterwards.

The Healer urged her to push. Push. How? How could she? Pushing hurt, really hurt. The veins were standing out on her neck and hands and Merlin knows where else. She pushed though, she had to. Her twins needed her to push. They were eager to get out into this world. And so she pushed.

Caitlyn Parvati Finnigan was born in a hot rush of blood and tiny, flailing limbs and pain. Parvati looked up into the eyes of her baby, her beautiful baby girl, and smiled. Caitlyn. She was vaguely aware of Lavender's eyes filling with tears and Seamus reaching out almost reverently to touch his daughter.

Her little Cait was taken off to be cleaned and swathed in blankets.

Meanwhile, her sister was eager to join her in this world. The pain was intense, fiery almost. The pain relieving potion seemed to have died off, she had no knowledge of how these things worked, they probably had a sort of time limit.

She screamed and groaned and moaned. Please, dear Merlin, get this baby out! Out! The pain would stop when Darcey was born. She kept her mind focused on that fact. It would all be over when she was born.

Pushing with all she had and shrieking so loud passersby probably thought she was being murdered, she delivered Darcey Padma Finnigan into this world.

She slumped back into the pillows. Seamus was kissing her forehead and smiling and Lavender was squealing and Dean entered, as laid back as ever. Everyone was smiling and laughing.

Parvati was desperate for sleep but first she wanted to see her babies, to check they were okay. They'd been whisked away to be cleaned up and medically examined. They were a little small, the Mediwitch told her, but that was normal for twins.

Finally, finally, she was allowed to hold her babies. They were brought in to her, she held out her arms automatically to accept her babies. She took Caitlyn into her arms and gazed down at her perfect little face. She was beautiful, of course she was. Seamus had taken her sister, Darcey, and looked completely awe struck. Make no mistake, he was going to be completely at these girls' mercy.

She smiled, leaning back into a pile of pillows, blissfully content. Her babies were safe and healthy and beautiful. (She had known they would be so but it was nice to have confirmation anyway.)

"You'll be godparents, right?" Seamus said directly to Lavender and Dean, who were holding hands and exchanging sappy smiles.

She and Seamus had talked about it, there was no one better they had decided. With these two as their godparents, the twins couldn't go far wrong.

Dean smirked as if there had been no doubt in his mind at all. Actually, knowing him, there probably hadn't been. "Course."

"Really?" Lavender said. She looked stunned and thrilled all at once, the expression was almost comical.

"Yes." Parvati said firmly, reaching out to her with one hand.

Lavender took it. "I'd be honoured."

"Did you want to hold her?" Parvati asked Lavender.

Lavender blinked and then nodded vigorously. Very carefully, Lavender took her. After that it became a bit of a free-for-all with the twins being passed from one set of arms to the other, Padma entered and cried a few tears over her two nieces. She'd been so pleased to discover that Darcey bore her name and that she'd been asked to be their third godparent – she'd cried all over Parvati and asked if they were really sure. Parvati had assured her that no one else would ever do. It was true. Padma was her sister, her twin, her biological other half. No one else would do.

Her parents arrived, disappointed they had missed the birth (in her mother's case anyway) and reverently held their first grandchildren. It was evident from the looks on their faces that they were utterly spellbound. They would be fantastic grandparents.

Eventually, much later, a Mediwitch entered and insisted that everyone leave to let the new family be together. She gave Parvati a Sleeping Draught to drink when she was ready to sleep and exited the room.

Parvati turned to her husband, little Darcey in her arms. Darcey was slightly smaller than her older sister and already had a tiny sprinkling of dark hair. Caitlyn was fractionally bigger with chubby little legs and a small freckle by her right eye. "Perfect, aren't they?" She had a feeling she was going to be a smug mother. But, with gorgeous girls like this, why on earth shouldn't she be?

"Yes." He replied simply. There was a pause. "This isn't going to be easy, is it?"

She laughed once. "Nope. I reckon it's going to be really really hard. But it'll be okay, won't it? We'll do it together."

"Of course." He said in a tone implying she was stupid to have even considered either. "It'll be us. You and me, I mean. Our twins – our Caitlyn and Darcey. And, of course, our third baby, our little Priya. We'll be just fine."

She smiled blissfully. "I love you."

He grinned. "I love you too."

They say as one chapter ends, another begins.

Their new chapter had just begun.

**IMPORTANT, PLEASE READ: Seamus and Parvati are starting their new chapter but, unfortunately, I will no longer be documenting their lives.**

**This story is gradually coming to an end and, as such, so are the stories of some couples. I have nothing left to write about these two (although they, along with every other couple, will feature in the epilogue so look out for them there!). ****This does mean that I will no longer be accepting requests for Seamus and Parvati although you can still request all of the remaining eleven couples.**** I hope you have enjoyed reading about these two as much as I have enjoyed writing them.**


	107. Harry and Ginny 10

**A/N: For gWeasley77, Elise Cullen, nikkiw73 and -Sirius-Black.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Harry x Ginny

"I haven't been back here since...y'know." Harry said in a low voice. He was gripping Ginny's hand very tightly.

She squeezed back in a gesture of comfort. "I know. I'm here." She added in a quiet tone.

"Shall we go then?" He asked her. It wasn't really a question she was meant to answer, a rhetorical question they were called, her answer was irrelevant. Harry was ready to enter the house.

They had returned to Grimmauld Place. Legally it was Harry's and now they were sure there were no Death Eaters residing there, they had decided to move in. They could afford to buy somewhere else but Grimmauld Place held a lot of memories, most of them good ones, and they both liked the house. They could make it into something nice, a real family home, the sort Sirius would have liked it to be. It made sense to live there.

Harry hadn't been able to face coming back here alone. Ginny had offered to come along. They were currently living at The Burrow. School had ended one week ago and they had the rest of their lives ahead of them. Lots of others were at The Burrow – Ron and Padma, Hermione and Theodore, Ginny and Harry, of course, as well as Molly and Arthur and the inevitable number of guests, such as the twins, who always turned up just in time for dinner and Percy who often stopped by – making living there rather uncomfortable and a little cramped although very sociable. It was about time they got their own place and technically they already had one just sitting there empty. It made sense to move in.

Harry had wanted to check it out first though to make sure it was safe and that they could both deal with living there. They would, later, gut the place completely. They didn't want to keep any of it. The Black heritage, family crest, blood superiority stuff. Sirius, too, had hated it. They had begun the work the summer they had stayed here but there was still a lot to do. Luckily, they had what was essentially an army of helpers. They would clear it out and redecorate, maybe add a few more windows in, bring in some new furniture (which they'd have to go shopping for, a whole other experience) and make it their own.

He strode forwards purposefully, crossing the road, Ginny walking alongside him, hurrying slightly to keep up.

He rummaged in his jeans' pocket for the key. Finding it, he inserted it into the lock, twisted and the door clicked. Next, after glancing around quickly to ensure no one was watching, he withdrew his wand and removed the magical wards guarding the house so they could enter. The magic guarding this place was strong.

Some of Dumbledore's wards still lingered and Mad-Eye had added to them and then Hermione had enhanced the protection further and there had already been a lot of wards in and around the house. Although both Dumbledore and Moody were gone from this world, traces of their magic still lingered. Harry wasn't sure how that worked, the Fidelius Charm had died with Dumbledore, but some of the wards were definitely still there.

Cautiously, he opened the door and stepped inside. The hallway was as dark and dusty as ever. The place seemed uninhabited.

As he entered, lights flicked on automatically a little like they were on Muggle sensors. Ginny followed behind him. Both had their wands drawn.

He remembered the spell Hermione had used to detect the presence of an intruder and made use of it. Relief washed through him, they were alone. He hadn't really expected anyone to be here but you could never be too sure.

"We're alone." He said.

Ginny relaxed her tense posture and lowered her wand just a fraction. "Harry, what happened...well, erm...is Kreacher still here?"

"I don't know." Harry said quietly. "I never knew what happened to him, I suspect he was tortured for information. I don't even know if he survived." Another war casualty.

"Have you tried calling him?" Ginny suggested.

"No." Harry admitted. "We couldn't at first because one of the Death Eaters might've come along with him and afterwards I never really thought about it."

"You could always try."

"Kreacher!" Harry called. "Are you here?"

There was no answer.

"He's gone." Harry muttered dejectedly. He had always suspected Kreacher had been killed but having his suspicions confirmed was an unwelcome fact. He had grown to like the surly little house elf.

There was a short pause before Harry continued on into the house. It was achingly familiar. He'd spent a lot of time here – first when it was Order headquarters and then with Ron and Hermione when they were trying to find the Horcruxes. He had thought that being there with his two best friends had cured him of the horrible sense of emptiness he felt every time he crossed the threshold. It hadn't.

It still hurt to be here. This was the one place in the world that he associated with Sirius, even though Sirius had hated it here. Sirius had lived here, had laughed here, had been surrounded by the people he'd loved here. And yet, Sirius had hated being here, he loathed this house and the awful memories it carried.

Still, this place reminded him of Sirius. Sirius, his godfather, who had been best friends with his dad, who had given up his life for him, for Harry.

Sirius was gone. He'd accepted that. It hurt though. It hurt a lot. Sirius had been almost like a surrogate father and when he had gone, had been cruelly snatched from this world, Harry had been all alone again.

He wasn't alone now. He had Ginny and he had his friends and a family in the Weasleys and yet, it wasn't still quite the same. He still felt the loss of his godfather as keenly as ever.

He was vaguely aware that Ginny was following him and that she appeared concerned. She understood. Although Sirius had not been as close to her, she still missed him and she understood the pain of grief.

The rooms were tired looking, cold and dark. Although lights sprang on wherever they walked, there were hardly any windows. The whole house needed a good clean.

They could make this place into something though, into a real family home. It would take a lot of foresight and a whole lot of hard work but together they could make this into their home, a place where they could raise a family and make new memories.

Ginny wandered from room to room in virtual silence. Coming from the warm, cosy, busy Burrow, this house appeared even more unappealing. It could be okay though. When it was sorted out, made into a home, they could be happy here. She would make sure of it.

They stopped in the kitchen. It was evident it hadn't been used for a long time.

"Yellow." Ginny said decisively.

Harry looked confused. "What?"

"For in here. We should paint it yellow. Put in a window, over there by the sink. When it's had a good clean, it'll look perfect."

"You really think so?" Harry said. He didn't look convinced.

Ginny nodded firmly. "Yes."

"Maybe we could even put a table in here, instead of having it in the big dining room." Harry suggested tentatively.

"Yeah, make it a bit more homely." Ginny agreed. "I don't like the dining room either, too...Black family."

Slowly, they wandered through into the living room.

"We have to paint over that." Harry said, gesturing to the huge family tree which sprawled over the walls.

"It gives me the creeps." Ginny said. "It's like a roll call of Death Eaters." She shuddered theatrically. "We could paint over it. All bright colours. Have it like Luna's room and put all pictures of us and our friends up there."

Harry grinned. "Definitely, like a wall of photos. Like in retaliation."

"We could have some family ones in there as well. Have you got any of your parents?"

Harry nodded. "Yeah, I have an album. They left me some more...stuff though. In a Gringotts vault, furniture and photos and stuff. Basically, it was whatever could be saved from their house. It was released when I turned seventeen but I've never been to get any of it."

"We should go and look at that. We could probably use all of it." Ginny said. She understood how important it was for Harry to have a family. Lily and James were his parents and she would ensure that anything they had left him was on display somewhere. Obviously having a chair or something that they had owned wasn't any kind of replacement for actually having his parents around but it was something. It was the best they could do.

"Should we look up stairs?" Harry said finally.

Upstairs was, if possible, in even worse condition than the downstairs rooms. Harry entered Sirius' bedroom with a lump in his throat. They had all slept in here – him, Ron and Hermione – whilst seeking Horcruxes. The beds were still unmade, the covers thrown back, they'd been left in the exact same state they had been when the three had left to infiltrate the Ministry. It was as if time had frozen in this room.

"You stayed here. Didn't you? In the war."

"Yeah." Harry said. "Not for long though, we accidentally let the Death Eaters in."

Ginny smirked. "Accidentally?"

He grinned back automatically. "Yeah." Even after this all time, she still had this effect on him. He couldn't help but smile back when she did. "This should be our room." He added at the end.

"It's not the main room though, is it?"

"No. But I do not want to sleep where Sirius' mum did." Harry said honestly. The very idea of it made him feel slightly nauseous.

Ginny looked horrified. "Merlin, no. This should definitely be our room."

Harry chuckled. "So, which child do we inflict that bedroom on?"

"None of them." Ginny said. "They'd end up traumatised. How about we knock it all down and then rebuild it? How many bedrooms does this thing have anyway?"

"Six." Harry replied absent mindedly.

She swatted at his arm. "You could have told me that before. We'll just seal off that room. It's not like we'll need it – we're not having any more than five children."

"Any more than five?" He said with a grin.

"Somewhere between three and five." She responded, looking at the floor as she spoke. Clearly, she had been thinking about this.

"Between three and five?" Harry asked, wrapping his arms around her slim form.

She looked up into his eyes as she spoke, some of her former embarrassment having faded. "Well legally we have to have three but then it all depends how many we want after that." She explained. "We might be too tired after three or it just might not be practical to have anymore for financial reasons or something, we have no idea what might be happening in our lives at that point. Or we might decide that our family isn't complete yet and that we want another little addition or two to complete things."

Harry leaned in to kiss his wife. "You've really thought about that."

"Ever since I was about eight years old." She confessed with a blush.

"Are you blushing?" He teased.

"No." She denied quickly.

He smirked and kissed her again. "I've thought about it as well." He confessed in a whisper. "Ever since Sixth Year, you've been it for me. You're everything to me, you're my whole family now Gin."

She looked up at him with a wicked grin on her face. "Let's make this family a little bigger then, shall we?"


	108. George and Luna 10

**A/N: For LovelyRoses, Nymphadora Potter, running-with-the-pack, Moldyshorts, SakuraHarunoGurl, Lucy Whitters and missb14.**

George x Luna

She'd had her fair share of new experiences this past year – getting married, getting pregnant, leaving school (prematurely) and moving in with her new husband in the little flat above his shop.

She'd enjoyed all of these new experiences. Getting married had been frightening at first, especially as she hadn't even known George that well, but she knew now that the right decision had been made. She had no idea how the Ministry had chosen the pairings but they had gotten it exactly right with her and George. She loved him so very much, it scared her sometimes how intensely she was in love with him. But that was how it was supposed to be, she thought.

Getting pregnant had been rather...enjoyable. She hadn't minded being pregnant either. It had suited her. Everyone said so. She loved being pregnant, it just felt so right. Whereas poor Hermione had huffed and puffed and complained at being unable to read books properly and poor Parvati had been so huge she couldn't even walk properly (and then she'd gone into labour at the Hogwarts graduation ceremony – Luna hadn't attended but it was all everyone was talking about), whereas they hadn't taken to pregnancy well, she had loved every minute of it. Even though it could be uncomfortable sometimes and yes, it was awkward. It didn't matter. She was carrying her child – her and George's child – and there was nothing in this world more natural or more right than that. She was convinced of it.

Leaving school had been a rather daunting experience but she had always known it was the right decision for her. She had liked school, of course, but she hadn't needed to go back for a final year. It simply wasn't necessary. Her place had not been at Hogwarts. Her place had been with George.

Moving in with George had been a natural progression as well. It was difficult, sometimes, to adjust to living with someone. She'd wondered if maybe they would annoy each other, find that the little things they had once thought were endearing would become faults or perhaps that they would find they didn't have anything to talk about. It hadn't been that way at all. They had both settled into their routines perfectly. It was nice living here, to be with George all the time.

This experience, however, was starkly different to all the others. She had hoped that because her pregnancy had flowed so effortlessly going into labour would be just as easy.

It wasn't. Labour was more painful than she had ever anticipated.

During the war she had been hit with the Cruciatus Curse. This was, quite possibly, worse. The only difference was that when you were Cruico-ed your mind went blank for some time. Labour, she had found, was crueller. Her mind was sharply focused. She could feel every agonising moment.

Contractions had taken her entirely by surprise. She'd just been sitting in the flat when the first one had hit. It had taken her a moment to work out what exactly had happened. She'd sat, one hand clutching her stomach, for a full minute before she'd jumped up and shouted for George.

He'd come running up, demanding to know what was wrong. When she'd told him she thought she was going into labour he'd frozen, finally asked if she was sure and then insisted they go to St Mungo's immediately. She'd tried to tell him that her contractions were still far apart and so it wasn't necessary yet but he always was shockingly overprotective. He hadn't even stopped to inform Fred he was leaving. Poor Fred had only found out as George pulled Luna through the shop, not stopping for anyone or anything. She'd just about managed to inform him she was going into labour and they were going to the hospital before her second contraction hit and her legs felt like they were going to crumple under her.

George had caught her and then proceeded to the hospital even faster than before. Bless him, he was so very worried about her.

She smiled at him. "I'm okay."

"B-" He started to interrupt.

"I'm okay." She repeated. "This is natural, it's fine. And at the end of it all, our little baby will be born."

He grinned in response and kissed her forehead. "I know. Our Coraline or Jem."

"I thought you didn't like the name Jem."

"You changed my mind." He smiled and kissed her fingertips.

She winced.

He was on his feet instantly, hands fluttering awkwardly. "Are you okay? What can I do? Do you need a Healer?"

She managed a half smile. "I'm fine, just relax."

He nodded once and sunk back into his chair. "Technically speaking I think this whole thing is completely backwards."

"How?" Talking helped. If she wasn't concentrating so much on the pain, it didn't seem to affect her as much.

"Well, shouldn't I be the one reassuring you?" He chuckled briefly.

"We're not like other couples though, are we? Hardly conventional." She said, her eyes closing shut.

"No." He agreed. "Not really."

"Who wants to be conventional anyway?"

The Healer entered the room then. "Okay then Mrs Weasley, how are you feeling?"

"I'm okay." Luna responded automatically.

"I think you're just about ready to go into labour now." The Healer said. "When you feel the urge to push you need to go with it and push as hard as you can."

Luna nodded. The pain had been slowly building up. She could sense that the baby was almost ready to emerge into this world.

Her little baby would be with her soon. She could hardly wait. She hadn't thought herself the maternal type but she had been shocked to find herself so...broody. Her arms ached for a baby. It wouldn't be long now though. She would have her little baby with her soon.

Suddenly, it came. The urge to push. She decided to go with it. Motherhood was about instinct and all her instincts were screaming at her to push.

Inhuman noises were spilling from her mouth and she couldn't bring herself to reign them in, George was gripping her hand and stroking her hair and telling her to keep going and the Healer was imploring her to push, telling her she could see the baby's head.

She kept pushing with everything she had in her. Her baby was ready to enter this world and she had to push to get him or her here.

A baby's cries cut through the noise. The pain receded and her whole body collapsed back into the soft embrace of the pillows.

"It's a girl!" The Healer pronounced.

Luna's arms reached out automatically for her baby, for her little girl, their Coraline Weasley. The Healer handed her over, Coraline now swaddled in a blanket.

"I'll just leave you to bond. I'll come back in about an hour." The Healer said tactfully.

Luna didn't respond. She was too busy looking at her baby.

Coraline.

She was perfect.

She was tiny with little wrinkled hands and slightly chubby legs. She had tiny hints of strawberry blonde hair and her eyes, when they opened, were blue. All babies eyes are blue to start with but Luna highly suspected that Coraline's would stay blue. Both her mother and father were blue eyed. She would take after them in this respect.

She wanted her daughter to look at lot like her father, so that she would fit in with all of her Weasley cousins, with red hair and blue eyes and freckles. She'd be beautiful, of course, and funny and smart. She'd have lots of friends. She'd be excellent at Hogwarts and end up being Head Girl. She'd love her family very much, helping to take care of her brothers and sisters and always spending time with all her cousins and extended family. She'd grow up happy and healthy and then, she'd fall in love with the perfect man. They'd be blissfully in love and one day they would get married. George would walk her down the aisle, maybe grey haired at this point or at least greying, and hand her over to her new husband. She, Luna, would be crying of course. Coraline would have kids as well, perfect, beautiful grandchildren.

Her life would be perfect. Luna would make sure of it. She wouldn't let anything hurt her baby. She was too precious for that.

As she watched her baby, she knew that she would die for Coraline in a heartbeat. She wouldn't even think about it. Even scarier, she knew that she would kill for Coraline. Just like that. She'd never been a violent person but if anyone threatened her baby...well, instinct would take over.

She looked up, George was staring down at Coraline with a similar expression of awe.

He kissed her forehead. "She's perfect. You're perfect." He said. Something suspiciously tear like glistened in the corner of one eye.

She smiled contentedly. "Of course she is."

Suddenly, Molly Weasley entered. "Is she okay? Are you ok-"

"Mum." George cut her off. "Come and meet your first grandchild."

Molly pressed one hand to her mouth and nodded hastily. Carefully, Luna handed her baby over to her grandmother. A look of absolute love crept over Molly's face. Luna smiled in response. Molly would be a wonderful grandmother.

Sometime later, when what seemed to be every single person they knew had visited (Fred had pronounced himself godfather – she'd been powerless to disagree because he'd been utterly spellbound by his niece and rather reluctant to give her back), they were just the three of them.

"What're you thinking about?" He asked her. He was absent mindedly drawing patterns on the back of her hands.

"Life." She said honestly. "And how little of it we've really lived."

"We've got forever ahead of us."

"Yeah." She said. There was a short pause. "Let's go."

"Go where?" He said completely confused.

"Anywhere. Wherever we feel like. I've always wanted to travel. Let's go and see the world!"

"Okay." He found himself agreeing. His mind was screaming at him telling him he was mad but he ignored it. He had the shop to run, it reminded him in a nasty little voice, and they had a house here and besides, all his family and friends were here. He'd be crazy to agree and yet he had.

Her words painted an inviting picture, he had always wanted to see more of the world that just their little corner of Britain, he wanted to go and see different things and experience a new way of life and who better to do that with that Luna, the love of his life, and his new baby daughter. (And, of course, he didn't really want to admit it but he could never deny Luna anything.)

"Really?" She seemed shocked. He wasn't surprised – he wasn't exactly the spontaneous type.

"Sure, why not? Fred can run the shop. He'll just have to hire more people to help out. I've got plenty of money saved. Let's go live."

She kissed him. "I love you."

"I love you too."

He leaned his forehead against hers, her eyes closed.

"So, we've had our Coraline. Jem next." He said with a wicked smirk.

She grinned. "And then we'll have to try and think of more names."

"Well, I've already thought of them." He said confidently.

"Go on."

"Coraline, Jem, Daniel, Evie and Jacob."

She blinked. "Daniel? Really? I mean, how many Ministry employees do you think are called Daniel? Absolutely l-" He cut her off with a kiss.

"I think you've just convinced me." She said a little breathlessly.

He threw his head back and laughed.

**A/N – PLEASE READ: Please don't hate me but...well, this is the last George and Luna chapter ever. They will, of course, be featured in the epilogue along with every other couple, but for now their story is over.****You can no longer request George and Luna, although you can still request the remaining ten couples.**


	109. Blaise and Hermione 13

**A/N: For trisha17, Moldyshorts, nikkiw73, CheshireCat23, missb14 and NewProphecy.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. **

Blaise x Hermione

Motherhood, she had found, was actually incredibly difficult. How did anyone do this?

She wasn't used to be so hopelessly out of her depth. She was Hermione Granger for goodness' sake. If she encountered a problem, she would do some research and eventually she would find the answer. She had been of the firm belief that there was a book for everything. (She wasn't so sure anymore). That was how she did things. Taking care of a baby did not come with an instruction manual, nor had any of the many, many books she'd gotten on motherhood been of any use whatsoever.

In fact, her biggest guidance right now was the words of Molly Weasley. Molly was an expert on mothering. She'd had seven children of her own and knew everything there was to know about babies.

It was Molly she'd run to (in a near hysterical state) when she had convinced herself Theodore was dying as a product of the 'rash' she had found on his tummy. Molly had taken one look and told her it was a birthmark and one which would probably disappear in time.

It was Molly who had taught her how to bathe Theodore. She'd shown her how to get the water to the correct temperature and the spell you used to ensure it wasn't going to be too cold or too hot. She'd shown her how to hold Theodore whilst bathing so that he was in the water but not completely submerged (and therefore at no risk of drowning). Molly had taught her to wrap Theodore up afterwards in a big fluffy towel so he didn't get chilled. She'd done all of this in a calm manner, somehow telling Hermione what to do without really seeming to do so at all.

It was Molly who had insisted that when Theodore had an afternoon nap, she, Hermione, had one as well. She'd told her, very firmly, that there was no shame in needing sleep and that she had always had an afternoon nap when she had a new baby.

She had to admit that the afternoon nap really was needed. She'd never been so tired in her whole life. She'd spent months on the run with Harry, and sometimes Ron, and during that time she'd done night watch shifts and so had, foolishly, expected to be able to cope with a lack of sleep. She couldn't. Sleep was a blessed, revered thing in her mind.

Theodore didn't seem to understand that she needed at least seven hours of uninterrupted sleep in order to be able to function as a normal, sane human being. Instead, he liked to wake throughout the night at regular four hour intervals, almost like clockwork, demanding to be fed. Immediately.

Molly was a saviour. Literally. Hermione wouldn't have made it through the first few weeks without her.

Like she said, she wasn't used to being out of her depth.

She'd worked her way through a series of enchanted defences set up by some of the most experienced witches and wizards in the world in her First Year. She'd worked out the secret of the monster terrorising Hogwarts (of course, it had got her first but that was a minor blip – she'd been petrified, not killed thank Merlin). In her Third Year, she'd helped a wanted (wrongly accused) murderer escape the Dementor's Kiss right under the noses of Ministry officials and the Minister of Magic himself. Fourth Year, she'd helped Harry to train for the Triwizard Tournament. In her Fifth Year, she'd been one of the founding members of an illegal, illicit, Defence Against the Dark Arts group. As well as that, she'd also duelled real Death Eaters after having snuck into the Ministry of Magic itself. The following year she had once again fought Death Eaters, this time inside Hogwarts. And, of course, she'd spent months on the run with Harry and Ron trying to find and destroy the Horcruxes. During this time, she had Stunned Ministry officials, disguised herself with Polyjuice Potion and crept into the Ministry, helped to set free some Muggleborns, hopefully saving them from imprisonment, successfully survived torture by the manic Bellatrix Lestrange and then escaped from the Malfoy Manor and all sorts of other dangerous, potentially fatal and difficult tasks, all of which culminated in the Final Battle where she fought Death Eaters and watched as Voldemort, the darkest wizard this world has ever known, was defeated by one of her best friends.

All of this went to prove that she was in fact very capable. She could take care of herself. She could deal with things.

And yet, she'd struggled so much in those first few weeks. She hadn't known anything about babies or taking care of one.

Molly had taken her into her home, given her and Theodore their own room (even though they had very little space in the house as so many people were staying there) and proceeded to, very patiently, teach her everything she knew. She would be eternally grateful to her.

It was easier these days though. She felt like she was treading water instead of drowning.

She was a vaguely competent mother. She knew sort of what she was doing and she had learned to trust her instincts a little more. They were usually right. She was, obviously, better at everything when she'd had more sleep but you couldn't control things like that.

She was still, to her amazement, as utterly spell bound by Theodore as she had been from the moment she set eyes upon him.

He was just over two months old now. He was putting on weight, he felt more solid and sturdy when she held him in her arms these days. He had even grown a tiny little bit of hair. It was dark, seemingly he was taking after Blaise there. Actually, he looked a lot like Blaise and she suspected the resemblance would only strengthen as he grew older.

He smiled back at her when she smiled which she loved. He smiled at everyone though – Molly (who was his grandmother, in all but blood, in fact she even insisted on being 'Grandma' to Theodore), Harry, Ginny (who spent most of her time hounding Hermione to be allowed to hold Theodore, although rather irritatingly she persistently called him 'Theo'), even Ron, who, rather tentatively at first, held Theodore quite willingly and seemed to be as entranced as everyone else was.

He even smiled at Blaise. He definitely seemed to recognise his father. Blaise, much to her surprise, was actually a hands on father. Well sort of. He wrote every single morning asking how his son was. He quite regularly also included a request to visit. She never denied him a visit. She was aware that she could hold this over him and refuse to let him see his son. She wouldn't though. She wasn't going to deny Theodore the right to know his father because she loathed the very sight of him.

She still hated Zabini as much as she ever did but she couldn't deny that he loved their little boy. His face still lit up every time he saw Theodore and she would never forget how he had looked the first time Theodore had smiled at him.

However, this morning's letter was a little longer than usual and rather unwelcome.

'_Hermione,_

_How is Theodore? I was wondering if I would be permitted to visit this afternoon around 3 o'clock, I've got a lunchtime meeting otherwise it would be sooner._

_I know you don't exactly see eye to eye but my mother is clamouring to visit. She just wants to see her grandson. I was wondering if she would be able to accompany me on my visit?_

_Blaise.'_

She frowned at it. What should she say?

On the one hand, she loathed Mrs Zabini and everything she stood for. On the other, the woman was (unfortunately) her son's biological grandmother. Her own mother hadn't even been to visit her grandson yet. He did deserve the chance to know his grandmother. Mrs Zabini did deserve the chance to know her grandson. Even if she was an awful, evil, malicious harpy of a woman.

Sighing loudly, she grabbed some parchment and a quill. She replied saying that Theodore was fine and that he could visit. Right at the end, she added that his mother would be permitted to visit if she wanted to.

She twitched and fidgeted away her time until it reached three o'clock.

Blaise always Apparated a little way away from The Burrow and then walked to the house. Molly always made sure that they had somewhere to themselves with no interruptions (it wasn't exactly a secret that her friends hated Blaise and he hated them right back – they tended to argue if they were all together). It was a nice day today, clear and sunny, so she sat in the garden.

She heard the knock at the door and reflexively tightened her arms around Theodore. He was awake, his big blue eyes gazed up at her and she exhaled slowly feeling a little calmer.

"Hermione, dear?" Molly called, appearing in her eye line a split second later. "Blaise is here and so is his...mother."

Molly looked worried. Hermione nodded. "I know, I said she could visit."

Molly nodded once and Blaise and his mother appeared. Molly gave her one last look - a look which said call me if you need me, I'll be close – and left them. Hermione knew that Molly would interrupt a few minutes later to ask if they wanted drinks and again ten minutes later to bring refreshments. In fact, she would find an excuse to be there as often as possible, something Hermione was vaguely grateful for. Blaise never stayed long anyway – half an hour at most – and with his mother here he probably wouldn't even stick around that long. It wouldn't be long, just fifteen minutes perhaps, all she had to do was remain calm and civil for quarter of an hour. It would be easy. She could do this.

"How are you?" Blaise asked, not quite meeting her eyes.

"I'm fine. So's Theodore, he's just woken up."

Blaise reached out for him. "May I?"

She handed Theodore over. Her arms felt redundant now, she didn't know what to do with them. She settled for crossing them.

"Hello Hermione." Mrs Zabini said tentatively.

"Hello."

"How are you?" She asked. She actually seemed concerned about her welfare, maybe the question was genuine and not just politeness or maybe she was a really good actress. Hermione wasn't sure.

"I'm fine thanks."

Mrs Zabini was standing about a metre away from where Hermione was sitting, Blaise was standing between them seemingly not even listening to their tentative, awkward conversation. He was smiling down at Theodore and muttering nonsense. It was astounding what being confronted with his son did to the proud, upright Slytherin. If only his cronies could see him now...

"May I...well, could I hold him? Theodore?"

She seemed nervous. Agitated even, Hermione noted. She clearly thought Hermione would say no. With good reason too, Hermione herself hated the woman but Theodore might not. Theodore might love his grandmother and she had to let him work that out for himself.

She nodded curtly. "Of course."

Blaise seemed shocked as well but he quickly masked it and gave his son to his mother.

Mrs Zabini seemed to melt as she looked at her grandson. One look. That was all it took. One look and her icy facade just vanished. She looked somehow more human as she looked at Theodore, less perfect, frozen Pureblood and more...regular.

"Hello little one." She murmured, stroking his cheek with one fingertip. She even cracked a smile, a real, genuine smile.

Hermione gritted her teeth. She wanted to grab Theodore and run away. She didn't want these two around her son. They would taint him with their predujiced ideas and blood supremacy. She folded her legs at the ankles. She couldn't spring up this way and this would hopefully stop her from doing something stupid.

There was a short silence which everyone seemed to find awkward and which no one knew how to fill.

"We should probably go now, Blaise." His mother said a little apologetically. Blaise nodded and took Theodore one last time.

Mrs Zabini turned to Hermione. "Thank you. I didn't think you would let me see Theodore, I wouldn't blame you if you'd rather I never saw him. He's...well, he's absolutely perfect isn't he? If you wouldn't mind, I'd like to visit again...perhaps, I could write?" She sounded sincere. She really did want to get to know Theodore. She couldn't deny her that much, could she?

Much to her surprise, Hermione found herself nodding. "Of course."


	110. Fred and Angelina 8

**A/N: For .Alice, missb 14, SakuraHarunoGurl and Rueflowersmall and delicate. Sorry it's been a little longer than usual I had some real issues writing this chapter.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Fred x Angelina

The waiting room was cold and clinical. The walls were starkly white. The chairs were wipe clean olive vinyl and incredibly uncomfortable. The flooring was that grey hard wearing carpet which will probably outlive the building itself. The only dash of colour came from the violently bright magazines arranged artfully on the too low table in the centre of the room. There were oddly muted posters on the walls as if they had been there a long while and had faded with age.

The receptionist at her desk just through the door looked perversely gleeful as if she were thriving on the stench of misery which permeated the air. Her hair was pulled back in a ferociously tight bun which looked like it surely must result in a headache. Her make-up was caked on, perhaps with a trowel or something each morning. She wore white robes and her body seemed to blend into the walls behind her. She seemed to be doing absolutely nothing but smile spitefully and file her nails.

There were two other couples in the waiting room. The first were evidently unfriendly. They had left a seat between them like a barrier and both were facing opposite directions. They hadn't exchanged a word since they arrived; in fact they hadn't even looked at each other once. The woman had her arms crossed defensively over her stomach. The man had a small crease between his eyebrows which suggested he spent a lot of time frowning and it had left its' mark on his face. The second couple were white faced and clasping each other's hands like a drowning man clutches a rock. The woman's foot was tapping nervously against the floor. This small noise was the only one in the whole room.

She and Fred were silent as well. This was not a place for laughter, even Fred had resisted from telling his usual jokes. He looked serious, more solemn than she'd ever seen him be. As she watched him from the corner of her eye, he shifted in his seat obviously trying to get comfortable on these chairs. The chairs were definitely not built for comfort.

She wondered what she looked like. Tired, perhaps, stressed, anxious? She wasn't sure.

"Mr and Mrs Weasley! Mr and Mrs Weasley to Room Three, please!" The receptionist yelled suddenly permeating the deafening silence with her shrill tones. She paused in her nonexistent duties to give them a hugely fake smile which didn't reach her eyes as they walked past before returning to redrawing on her eyebrows with what looked like a crayon.

They walked, hand in hand, down the corridor. It was lined with doors, all white to blend in with the walls, and all with a large, black number on. Room Three was, rather logically, the third door down.

Cautiously, Fred knocked on the door and entered without waiting for any response.

Room Three was like any office – desk, three chairs, tiny window, filing cabinet and a few family photographs to add a 'personal' touch. The man sitting behind it was grey haired with a neat little moustache. He was wearing plain black robes and a grimace which was possibly intended to be a smile.

He stood up to shake their hands.

"Mr Weasley. Mrs Weasley. I'm Mediwizard Wilson, specialist in fertility. Please take a seat." They sat in the chairs opposite him. These were just as awkward as the ones in the waiting room. He leaned back in his chair and clasped his hands together expectantly. "Now, how can I help you?"

"We're having trouble conceiving." Angelina said bluntly. Why would they be here otherwise?

"I see, and of course you were...matched by the Ministry?" He asked.

They nodded.

"And would you say your union is a happy one?" A Quick Quotes Quill (or something similar) jumped into action and began taking notes on a piece of parchment near his left elbow. Mediwizard Wilson didn't bat an eyelid.

"Yes." They said in exact unison, exchanging quick glances and half smiles at their joint answer.

"Interesting. So, you cannot conceive and presumably you are subject to the marriage contracts." The Mediwizard adopted a thoughtful (and faintly ridiculous) face.

They nodded again.

One clause of the marriage contracts both had signed was that their first child must be produced within the first two years. They'd been married for one year now. They had one year to have a baby – three months maximum, given that a pregnancy was nine months.

Neither had wanted to come here but it was a last measure. They'd been trying for six months now, after losing their first child, and nothing had happened. Time was running out and neither wanted to be in breach of the law.

They were desperate for a baby. Angelina in particular. She just wanted a little baby, her very own little boy or girl, to hold and to love. All around her seemed to be babies, they were everywhere! In prams, being held in arms, smiling and gurgling, dressed in pastel shades of pink and blue and yellow. Everywhere she went there were babies. There seemed to be one on every street corner.

"Have you been able to successfully conceive previously?"

"Yes." Angelina said in an almost whisper. The pain of losing their very first baby was still sharp. "We lost our first baby just two months into the pregnancy."

"And that was...how long ago?"

"Eight months ago." Fred replied.

"Okay, forgive my crudeness, but you two...do you comply with the law regarding intimacy?" The Mediwizard seemed unable to say the 's' word.

"Yes." Angelina replied uncomfortably. She hated this place, had done from the very second she lay eyes on it, it was awful. She hated everything from the smirking receptionist to the awful cold feeling to the embarrassing questions about things she firmly believed should remain private.

There was a short silence. The Mediwizard seemed to have finished with his questioning. "Now, the way I see it, the two of you do not have much time left to you to conceive a child. There are three months at the very most before you are breaking the law, although I do believe the Ministry will be lenient if you are at least pregnant by the time the two year mark elapses. Infertility can happen to any couple at any time and it's usually only temporary. It could be stress related, it may be a side effect of losing your first child – either physically or psychologically. We can investigate further. However that will take time. I believe that if you have issues conceiving any further children then further testing should be done, however you won't have any time issues then and it can be done at your leisure. Now though you two don't have time to wait for you to fall pregnant, you need to do something. I believe it is in your best interest, however, to consider fertility treatment."

They were stunned into silence. Fertility treatment? Neither had anticipated such drastic measures. Fertility treatment wasn't popular with wizards and witches. It wasn't taboo by any means but it definitely wasn't something you talked about in public. It was a last resort, your final chance at having a baby.

She hadn't expected this. She was young and healthy and obviously could conceive a child. Fertility treatments were for witches who had left it too late to have children naturally or those who had medical issues preventing them from getting pregnant.

Her and Fred exchanged horrified looks at his words. They were evidently both thinking the same things.

And yet, this Mediwizard was an expert. He knew what he was talking about. He was right, they didn't have long left, not long at all and it hadn't happened in six months. It certainly wasn't through lack of trying. It just wasn't happening for them and it was crucial that it did happen. And soon. Maybe this was the only option left to them.

"We use a very similar technique to Muggle doctors. It's called IVF. I'm not sure how much you know about it but I'm going to give you some leaflets and information pamphlets to read through."

"Can...do we have to decide now?" Fred said finally.

"No," the Mediwizard said. "Of course not, you can have some time to go home and discuss it. However, if it is to be effective, you will need to make your decision by the end of this week."

"That's four days." Angelina said blankly. He couldn't be serious. How could they make a decision over something as huge and momentous and life changing as this in just four days?

"I'm afraid so." He said in an almost apologetic fashion. "If you book an appointment for Friday, you can just cancel it if you decide not to go ahead."

They left in a dazed silence only just remembering to say goodbye and to thank the Mediwizard. As they left, he handed them a huge pile of brightly coloured leaflets with chirpy titles and pictures of beaming, pregnant couples on the front. The receptionist booked them an appointment wearing an irritated expression throughout as if they were causing her a great inconvenience.

Neither spoke as they Apparated back to their flat. Angelina immediately sat on the sofa, flopping back uselessly. Fred, in contrast, began pacing relentlessly in their small living room. Back and forth. Back and forth.

Angelina slowly picked up a leaflet and began to read through it. The information in it was useful but some it horrified her. The successful birth rate statistics in particular seemed very low. There was a less than fifty percent chance that this would even work.

"What do we do?" Fred said finally, coming to a halt in front of his wife. He pinched the bridge of his nose – a rare stressed gesture she'd only seen him do a very few times before.

"I don't know." She whispered, the leaflet falling from her lap and spiralling to the floor.

He dropped to his knees in front of her, grabbing both of her hands in his own. He looked her straight in the eye. "I'll do whatever you want. If you think this is what we should do then I do to and I'll go along with it and we'll do whatever we have to do. If you don't want to do this then I'm fine with that as well and we'll keep trying and pray that it happens soon."

She blinked. "You can't put this on me, Fred. Merlin, please don't make it my choice."

"It has to be." He said. "I don't want to put it all on you. I swear I don't and obviously we'll talk ot over together. But it will affect you the most. The treatment will be centred around you and it will all happen to you. If there are any side effects they'll happen to you, likewise if it works out then it'll happen to you. I think it has to be you that makes the final decision. I don't have an opinion either way, I can see it both sides. I'll do whatever you think is best, I swear."

She sighed. "I don't know Fred, I just don't know. It might not even work out. The success rates are so low and what if...I don't know, what if something goes wrong? There's a high chance of a multiple birth and you're a twin so it's even more likely and...well, twins will be so much more difficult. And it'll be awkward and embarrassing and uncomfortable. I mean how would we tell everyone? Would we even tell anyone? Can we keep something like this secret? And what if...well, what after we've gone through it all it just doesn't work."

She looked up at him, willing him to have all the answers. He stared right back silently asking her to make the decision so that he didn't have to.

"What do we do?" He asked again.

"I don't know. I really don't know."


	111. Oliver and Alicia 8

**A/N: For nikkiw73, Belles27, Shanii21, pistachio53 and Two spring butterfly's. Apologies for the slight delay – life took over and I couldn't get to a computer.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Oliver x Alicia

"I hate you." She spat the words at him, anger twisting her features, eyes wild.

He smirked. "I know you do, sweetheart."

She didn't hate him. She just liked to think she did.

"I do!" She wailed like a small child. Clearly, she had picked up on the disbelieving note in his voice.

"I know." He repeated calmly knowing that his unruffled state would rile her further.

She shoved at his chest furiously. It didn't move him at all. She was significantly smaller than him and always seemed to overestimate her own strength. He just grinned. He knew exactly how to wind her up, what to say, what to do to make her more angry. Acting blasé about things was a sure fire way to make her mad.

She went to slap him but luckily Quidditch reflexes helped him out and he caught her arm. He took a step forward, moving closer to her, and she instinctively took a step backwards to avoid him.

"Get off me!" She hissed through her teeth.

He dropped her arm before she decided to curse him, as she had done before, and she quickly drew it in to her side, away from him.

"Now, get out! I don't want you here anymore, go on. Just go. Leave!" She yelled.

He smirked – she wanted to throw him out of his own house. "No." He took another step forwards. He could see the panic in her eyes – he'd backed her into a corner. She couldn't manoeuvre out of it, she had no choice but to take another step backward to avoid actually touching him. Her back hit the wall with a dull thump and her whole body tensed, clearly she had noticed her mistake.

Gently, but quickly so as to have the element of surprise, he grabbed both her wrists and took them in one hand. Pinning them against her head, he leaned in and kissed her. She kissed back before she even realised what had happened. He could pinpoint the exact moment when she realised what she had done, how she had given up, because her hands reached up to grip his shoulders angrily, almost painfully. She half growled into the kiss and his lips turned up in response.

He loved winding her up. He didn't even know why, he just knew that something about making her lose control just appealed to him. Maybe it was the way she looked when she was mad – absolutely beautiful and seriously hot. Or maybe it was just the confirmation that he could get under her skin just as much as she got under his (and she did, she made him so mad he could hardly think straight most of the time).

Their whole relationship was a power struggle revolving around arguments. They would argue over everything, even tiny tiffs over stupid insignificant things soon escalated into full blown rows, and whoever wasn't losing it entirely would be the winner and that person would have the power.

It wasn't right. It wasn't how relationships were supposed to work. It was them though, it was just how they were. They probably weren't designed to coexist. Two people so fiery and passionate and hot tempered shouldn't live in close conditions. It wasn't healthy. It was just bound to end up like this.

They were like magnets – both the same poles. They repelled each other, fought against being placed side by side.

And yet, yet it wasn't like that all the time. After they'd argued, they made up and when they were making up they definitely weren't repelling each other.

There was no denying the attraction they had for each other. The fire and passion and rage they had for each other when they were arguing also transferred itself to when they weren't arguing.

True they argued most of the time, more time than they weren't. But they were passionate – about each other as well as during their arguments.

He found the arguments exciting. They kept the relationship alive. At least when they were screaming at each other they were acknowledging each other in some way. The arguments proved that there was passion in their relationship. It proved that they still did care, even if it was just caring enough to hate. If they didn't argue, they both feared that there would be nothing there at all. They would just spend their days drifting past each other, ignoring each other. Neither wanted that. At least this way there was something there.

It got tiring though. When he came home from a long day training to find Alicia waiting for him, hands on hips, expression murderous and he'd have to desperately try to remember what he had done wrong (usually he only found out when she started yelling), he wondered if this was really it, if this was how life would be forever and whether they could sustain this level of anger for the rest of their lives.

Sometimes arguing was just tiresome. It would be nice to come home, dinner waiting on the table (Alicia was a fantastic cook) and to have an actual discussion over dinner, chatting long into the night, before going to bed.

Of course, that was hardly likely. Alicia was, he had found, rather scatter brained. She always seemed to be one step behind whilst everyone else was planning for the future. She didn't look ahead, she concentrated solely on the present, the here and now.

She very rarely had dinner waiting, in fact most of the time dinner wasn't even beginning when he arrived home, because she would get side tracked by something else – a book perhaps or one of those Muggle television programmes she was addicted to or talking to someone via the Floo network (usually her best friend Katie – who was living in the Malfoy Manor and loathing every minute of it) – and simply lose track of time.

It annoyed him a little. He liked punctuality and regularity and order. Even his job was disciplined, it was how he was. She was the exact opposite. She never wore a watch, never even had any idea what the time was, was never on time to anything at all, didn't follow any kind of rule and moved around in her own little bubble, doing what she wanted when she wanted to. If she felt like eating breakfast at noon then that was exactly what she did. If she didn't feel like sleeping, she wouldn't go to bed until the following morning. If she didn't want to go home yet, she'd insist on staying out all night. She didn't seem to care what time it was or what time things were supposed to be done.

She pulled away from him, her voice breathless (something that was bound to annoy her – her lack of self control always wound her up). "I hate it when you do that."

"I know, baby."

"And I really hate it when you call me baby." She didn't like pet names.

"Yeah." He agreed. "I know that as well."

"So why'd you do it?" She didn't even sound confused. She knew why. Of course she did. She did it as well. She was always doing things specifically to irritate him; she'd do anything to get a rise. They both would.

"You know why."

She didn't even bother to respond. Saying her acceptance out loud would be the ultimate confirmation that their relationship revolved around arguing very loudly with each other and then passionately making up afterwards and that wasn't how relationships were meant to be.

"I should get dinner." She said, sliding past him (with some difficulty as he did have her pressed against the wall).

He grabbed her waist as she went and kissed her again, tenderly, sweetly this time.

She smiled and danced away to the kitchen. When she was happy, she was like a little Stepford Wife. He wasn't going to voice the thought because it wouldn't end well. It was true though, when she was in a good mood she seemed to take pleasure from running an orderly home. She was as he'd said before a really good cook and she did keep the house sparkling clean. She seemed to enjoy it. He did his fair share as well but sometimes he'd come home to find she'd already done some of the things he was supposed to do.

He could hear her now, clattering around the kitchen and humming soft, indecipherable tunes to herself. She did enjoy cooking, if he offered to take her out for dinner she seemed scandalised.

Dinner would be a while yet, he sat down on the sofa, picking up today's Daily Prophet. He flicked through it, not really paying much attention. He was still pondering the idea of him and Alicia.

He was so lost in thought, he physically jumped when he heard Alicia scream.

A surge of adrenaline sent him flying into the kitchen expecting perhaps a fire or a rogue Death Eater something equally as bad. Instead, he found his wife standing in the middle of the kitchen, wearing a horrorstruck expression and muttering inaudibly to herself. She kept pressing one finger to her other fingers, kind of like she was counting or something.

"What's wrong?" He demanded, checking her over with her eyes to ensure she was physically well. "What is it?"

She held up one hand impatiently signalling him to be quiet and continued counting.

"Oh sweet Merlin." She whispered. Her lips kept moving although no sound was coming out.

"C'mon, Lissy, what is it?" He pleaded. What on earth was wrong?

She blurted the words out. "IthinkI'mpregnant."

It took him a moment to separate the words and when they finally sunk in he gasped. "You...you're?"

She nodded. "I think so."

"Well, how do we check?"

"There's a spell." She drew her wand with shaking hands and muttered something he didn't quite catch.

A little pink circle appeared above her stomach. He stared at it for a moment. What did that mean? He didn't know anything about pregnancy test spells, hell he didn't even know anything about pregnancies but that they lasted nine months and resulted in a baby.

"Does...what does that..." He trailed off.

"I'm pregnant." She said quietly. He could feel her watching him gauging his response. Clearly, she hadn't known how he would respond.

His grin was ecstatic. She was pregnant! They were having a baby! "This is amazing!" His arms wound around her waist, hugging her, lifting her off her feet. Still holding her, he pulled back enough to see her face. "Aren't you happy?"

"Yes." She smiled. "I am." He could see tears shining in her eyes and leaned into kiss them away.

This was the happiest day of their lives.


	112. Draco and Katie 12

**A/N: For SakuraHarunoGurl, Malory14, lovenotwar, Nymphadora Potter and Belles27.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Draco x Katie

A knock on the door usually didn't mean anything in particular. Very few were allowed to enter the gates to the Malfoy Manor, there were very strong enchantments placed both on the gates and in the grounds themselves, and so any guests were usually expected. House elves would get the door and the visitor would be shown to the relevant room or member of the household.

This knock, which came at around mid morning, was a little different. For a start, no one was expecting a guest. It was a dull thudding noise, fractionally louder than visitors usually knocked. Maybe it was just a particularly pertinent visitor.

From her position, curled up in a chair of the library, she barely blinked. The guest, whomever it was, wouldn't be for her. None of her friends ever visited her here – they didn't want to and she would rather meet up with them elsewhere, it gave her an excuse to get out of the house. She turned back to her book and tuned out the rest of the world. She had always been able to do that, to lose herself in a book. Sometimes she would lose track of time entirely when she was reading.

The Malfoy libraries (oh yes, the Malfoy family had more than one library, they were definitely that sort of family even though she had never seen any of them even pick up a book in her presence) were very well stocked and she spent most of her time reading now. It was a sort of compromise that she and Narcissa had worked out. Narcissa had, as anticipated, tried to insist on full time bed rest when Katie had announced she was pregnant. Katie had argued back (well, sort of, it was hard to argue when the other person wouldn't actually retaliate or raise her voice in any way) and instead she was supposed to spend the morning resting, although she didn't actually have to be in bed whilst she did so. It didn't bother her. It wasn't exactly like she'd been doing anything particularly strenuous beforehand.

There seemed to be more footsteps than usual. Odd but not unheard of. Maybe there was more than one visitor. A whole party of them. Fantastic.

She ignored the commotion. Whatever it was, it didn't concern her. If she was wanted, Draco would probably come and find her and introduce her to their guests. He usually did anyway. Until then she could just continue reading. It was probably a business partner of his, or more likely an employee. Or maybe Narcissa had gotten a dressmaker in, only the other day she'd been talking about having some new gowns made.

This place, the Manor, still didn't feel like home (she wasn't sure it ever would) and she wasn't completely comfortable with going to find out what was going on. She wasn't sure if she was expected to or allowed to. It was obviously nothing to do with her. She felt like a little child again, upstairs in bed whilst all the adults had fun downstairs.

She waited again, half reading her book, the other half firmly focused on listening to what was going on around her. She could hear voices – they were too far away to be anything more than a babble of noise though. She couldn't distinguish any of the voices or work out what they were saying. There was definitely someone here though; Narcissa and Draco couldn't make that much noise by themselves. Especially considering that Narcissa never raised her voice. Ever.

Curiosity got the better of her and she put her book down and padded into the hallway. The voices sounded a little closer now, she walked confidently, as if she had every right to be here, towards the noise.

They appeared to be in the drawing room. She entered cautiously. She was vaguely aware that she wasn't really dressed to appear in company.

"Katie!" Draco said happily when he saw her. "Guess what?"

"Or who rather?" An unknown male voice said from out of sight. It sounded amused and rather a lot like Draco's aristocratic tones.

She stepped further into the room, unsure of what was going on. She blinked. Nope – it was still there. There were quite clearly three Malfoys sitting in the drawing room.

Draco was lounging in the leather armchair looked pleased with himself, Narcissa, who was smiling, actually smiling, perched on the corner of the sofa as customary and sitting beside her was a man who was unmistakeably related to them. He had the same pointed face and blonde hair – he was a larger, older version of Draco.

As she watched him, he rose to offer her his hand. "Katie, is it? Nice to meet you, my name is Lucius. I'm your father in law."

She took his hand, even though every cell in her body was screaming at her to do otherwise, and as she drew away her thoughts grew too many in number, they were whirling around too loudly, she couldn't think straight...she felt too warm even though there was no fire lit in here, why was it so hot?...the world seemed to blur uncomfortably...too bright...she thought she was going to be sick...oh Merlin... and that's when it all went black.

When she came to, she was lying in her bed. As her eyes opened, a crack sounded alerting her that a house elf had Disapparated. She wondered for a brief second who it was going to alert. She hoped it wasn't Lucius, she didn't want him in here, in her room. A few moments later, Draco appeared followed almost instantly by Narcissa.

"Kate, how are you?" Draco said worriedly, scanning her with his eyes.

"We were so worried." Narcissa said faintly. She actually looked concerned – whether for Katie's own wellbeing or for her grandchild's Katie wasn't sure.

"I'm fine." She managed. Her voice sounded weak and pathetic. "Just over tired I expect. It's normal for pregnant woman as well."

"I'm sure Lucius must have given you quite a fright, none of us were expecting him." Narcissa said, patting her hand rather like one might pet a favourite dog.

Draco remained silent. Katie glanced at him – obviously he knew exactly why Katie had blacked out.

"We're going to call in a Mediwitch to check you over. We want to ensure both you and the baby are well." Narcissa told her in what was obviously meant to be a soothing tone. She looked from Katie to Draco. "I'll leave you two alone for a moment."

Draco sat down on the bed, facing Katie. He drew his wand and cast a Silencio charm over the room. "Go on then." He said, raising an eyebrow almost daring her to disagree. "Say it, I know you're dying to."

"What on earth is your father doing here? He's supposed to be in Azkaban! He deserves to be there. He's a murderer! Murderer! How can he be freed? What is the Ministry thinking? He needs to be locked up. I can't live here, not with him here. I won't do it. How can I? It makes me feel sick, for Merlin's sakes. I'm moving out. I'm going to live...well, with Alicia. I can't stay here. Please, don't make me stay here." Her angry rant turned pleading. She couldn't stay here, didn't he get it? He couldn't expect her to live under the same roof as a murderer.

"You can't go." Draco said flatly. "You have to stay here with me."

"No." She replied indignantly. She really hated being told what to do. She had agreed to move into this Merlin awful place with him because she had nowhere else to go. She hadn't agreed to stay here with a murdering, torturing, dangerous Death Eater. Lucius wouldn't hurt her, Draco and Narcissa would never allow it, and besides she both a Pureblood and family. It didn't reassure her much though. He was still awful. She knew what he was really like and she didn't want to be anywhere near him. People, friends, people she had known had died in the war. It was highly plausible that he had killed them. He was dangerous. Really dangerous. She couldn't stay here. She had her child to think about as well. She couldn't expose an innocent newborn to Lucius.

"I will not live apart from you Katie. It's not how things are done. I need to be with you and with our child." He glanced at her stomach.

"I can't live here." She folded her arms stubbornly, blocking his view of her stomach.

"You must." He said quietly. "Father will be offended if you go. He'll know it's because of you. However, I have a solution."

"I don't care. I don't care about offending your father, to tell the truth the sight of him offends me."

"Don't talk about my father like that." His voice was cold. She knew she had crossed a line but she didn't care, she was too far gone to care about anything but the urge to flee. "I said I had a solution so just listen a moment, Kate." At the use of her nickname, his face softened a little. She continued glaring. "Give me one week. I'll start looking around for a new place. We'll say that we don't want to impose on them anymore, they'll understand and it won't hurt anyone's feelings. Anyway it's about time I moved out."

"You're going to buy a house?" She asked, a fraction disbelievingly. She knew he had money but did he really have access to enough funds to just go out and buy a house.

"It'll probably be bigger than just a house." He said honestly without a trace of the arrogance she was so accustomed to.

"It doesn't have to be. Not everyone was brought up in a manor." She teased lightly. She never thought the day would come when she would joke with Draco Malfoy. What was the world coming to?

"I was though." He grinned. "I reckon it's in my blood. Anyway, what do you say?"

She sighed. His was actually a good plan. She didn't really want to offend Narcissa, her mother-in-law had been fairly pleasant to her, and she could avoid Lucius as much as possible. One week wasn't that long. It would be nice to move out of this place as well. She'd be able to have more freedom.

Besides, she had never wanted to bring her children up in a place like this, the whole place held an aura of misery. Their new house would be fresh and untainted, she could decorate it up which would help her fill up her days. She wouldn't have anything green or silver there at all and definitely nothing with a family crest on.

Draco was much better by himself. They were almost getting along these days. Draco would definitely employ house elves to make life easier. It would be okay living with him, awkward perhaps and definitely a whole new experience, but she could live with it. She didn't want her children to grow up living apart from their father – that wasn't how families worked.

"Okay." She agreed.

He smiled tentatively at her and she grinned back.


	113. Lee and Pansy 6

**A/N: For LovelyRoses, -Sirius-Black, random-fruitcake04 and Ookami Mononoke **

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Lee x Pansy

I swore loudly under my breath and then, reasoning that no one of any importance would hear me, swore more loudly. What did it matter anymore? My life was pretty much over.

I'd been captured.

Captured. I'd spent a lot of time on the run, I'd been specifically trained for weeks to evade capture and in the end it had taken just two Aurors to locate, find and arrest me. They hadn't even been hardened, experienced Aurors, one of them was definitely a newbie. It was seriously embarrassing. I hadn't even been able to fight back properly as I'd been Disarmed before I could even blink. I'd gotten in a few half decent punches though, definitely got one in the face, hopefully broke his nose or something.

I'd been on a rare trip to England, my first time home in months. Our unit got summons from HQ - they wanted me to go over and make a broadcast direct from London, right under the noses of the Ministry. Of course I said yes. Firstly, you do not say no to direct orders. It would be suicidal. Secondly, I fancied the challenge. It would be a right kick in the teeth for old Kingsley, a protest radio station run by an illegal group criticising his government from their doorstep.

I was captured just outside London. I don't even know how they knew who I was. All I can say is that I must be more wanted than I thought. They probably had a bit of a campaign, maybe I was in the papers, and some busybody with nothing else to fill their meaningless life recognised me and alerted the Ministry. That's one option. It's the option I'm hoping for.

The other is too awful to even think about. The other option, the dreadful option, is that there is a mole within the resistance group. A mole, a high up mole, who knew exactly where I would be, with the power to send summons (or to know that summons were being sent) and tipped off the Aurors as to my whereabouts. I can't even think about that though, I need to concentrate on escaping.

I wonder if they've made a big hoo-hah about my arrest in the press. Maybe they've boasted about my capture all over the papers. At least that way my unit will eventually find out what's happened to me.

My capture is disastrous for my unit. I was the main broadcaster for the radio show. Okay, I could be replaced, but I was the voice. The one that people knew about. People tuned in because they knew about me.

Of course, personally, it was looking pretty bad as well. I was facing a definite Azkaban sentence. Five years, perhaps, more if the Wizengamot are feeling particularly vindictive. Whatever happens, it'll be grim. Azkaban is...well, I know people that have been there and they've never come back quite the same. Even Hagrid, who was physically stronger than anyone I know, came back shaken and broken. Penny had nightmares about it, she'd wake up in the night screaming about the Dementors and the things she saw her. I'd comfort her sometimes, if I wasn't on duty, and help her get back to sleep. If I was on duty, she'd usually come and join me, bleary eyed and clutching a mug of coffee like a lifeline and we'd chat about nothing in particular until my shift was over or she fell asleep. She was a good girl was Penny. I always wondered how someone like Percy got someone like her. Penny's studious like Percy always was and there is definitely a Ravenclaw personality in there but she also tells filthy jokes and swears like a trooper and can down a pint as well as any man. Like I said, she's a good girl.

I looked around my surroundings, trying desperately to think of something, anything, which could help me escape. I was in a room. It was tiny. I sat in a chair in the middle, magically bound to it with no physical restraints. It was reasonably well lit. There were no windows but one quite average looking door. Presumably it was locked but I doubted there would be much more protection on it – I was physically stuck in this chair, unable to get up until the caster released the charms. I wasn't getting out of here. If I could only get my wand I could release myself and I'd be out of here faster than you'd think possible.

Unfortunately, they confiscated my wand. They won't snap it. Not yet. If I am convicted, it'll go into special storage. It's where all the wands of prisoners go, the idea is that even if you escape you won't have a wand. Clever really. Didn't work with the Death Eaters though. They escaped and then smashed their way into the storage vault (somehow they'd managed to find out where it is) all without magical aid. I have no idea how they did that when I can't even free myself from this chair. All those months of training have been wasted. I've been drilled on what to do in this situation – say nothing. Nothing at all. Not only does it mean you don't incriminate yourself or anyone else, it also drives the interrogators mad. A double whammy, if you like.

The door opened and a short, squat little wizard walked in followed by his grey haired friend.

The shorter one seemed to be in charge because he did all the talking. "Lee Jordan, you have been detained under charges of participating in illegal terrorist activity."

Terrorism? Merlin, I wouldn't go that far. A bit of chattering on the radio? Since when was that terrorist activity.

He continued. "However, we have decided not to try you in front of the Wizengamot. The Ministry doesn't wish to give free publicity to the group you joined by having a big, public trial. Instead, we have decided that you will be treated as a regular citizen."

No trial? Regular citizen? This sounded too good to be true. I wondered what the catch would be.

"As such you will be subject to the current marriage law. Your intended spouse, Miss Parkinson I believe, has remained unmarried. You two will be expected to follow through on your engagement. Miss Parkinson is abroad at the moment but owls have been sent and she is expected to return tomorrow. Due to the nature of your...relationship, the marriage will happen tomorrow on Ministry property." The whole time he was speaking he had this smug little grin on his face. He knew exactly what he was doing, he was fancying it up with all these big words but he knew exactly what he was doing. He must have known that Azkaban wouldn't be the worst possible punishment for me. No, the ultimate sentence would be having to do the thing I had run away from in the very first place.

Marry Pansy Parkinson.

I had run away from home, leaving my possessions, friends and family behind me, joined an illegal resistance group, endured weeks of physical training, lived rough in Merlin awful conditions and set up an illegal resistance radio station in order to avoid marrying Parkinson. It seemed now that all my efforts had been entirely in vain. Why had I even bothered? The Ministry had won.

I slumped in my chair in defeat.

The little man's grin widened. "I take it you are in agreement with the proposals made?"

"No." I said hoarsely, my voice cracked through lack of use. "I want to go to Azkaban. Put me in prison."

"Unfortunately, that is not an option. Miss Parkinson is undoubtedly a charming young woman and I am certain your future together will be very happy and blessed with lots of beautiful children." Beaming contentedly, the little man left shadowed by his older, silent colleague.

Merlin, sweet Merlin. What could I do?

I had been in this situation before and running had been my only option. That one was out for now. It left suicide. I couldn't bring myself to do it then but I reckoned I could now – that was, of course, if I wasn't frozen in this chair unable to move anything more than my eyes and my mouth.

It was hopeless. I was facing a future with Parkinson and there was nothing I could do about it.

On the bright side, I wouldn't have to live with her. I could move back into my old flat or somewhere similar. I could limit seeing her to the compulsory stuff and nothing else. I could have my old life back, I could see my friends again and enjoy a good life.

On the bad side, I would be married to Pansy Parkinson. Married. I'd have to sleep with her and everything. Even the idea of it made me feel nauseous.

The good side did sound well, good...but I wasn't sure it was enough to outweigh the bad. There were a lot of negatives in there.

I spent my last night of freedom thinking. I had nothing else to do; I wasn't exactly comfortable enough to sleep. I thought about everything. About my cell who must by now know what had happened to me. About the radio station which might not last without me. About my cell mates who had become my best friends in such a short space of time. About Penny who would have to suffer her nightmares alone now that I wasn't there.

I knew it was morning only by the increase of activity outside the door. People tramped backwards and forwards probably going to their offices, which I thought were at the end of this corridor.

I had no idea how much time had passed when the door opened. Outside the passage was dark, suspiciously dark. I tensed whatever I could in anticipation, what was happening? The fight or flight instinct was screaming at me to do something, anything. I remained frozen. This seemed a little theatrical for a Ministry employee.

Suddenly, I heard a muffled cursed and some very familiar faces appeared. Silently, they got to work. Ernie shut the door and set a locking charm on it, he also cast a spell so that anyone approaching the door would suddenly remember an important engagement and dash off. Ernie was a master at stuff like that. He was easily the most magically gifted amongst us and he just knew about all these spells no one else seemed to have even heard of.

Penny beamed at me. "I've got you a present."

"We got you a present." Yates corrected smoothly.

"Took us a bloody long time to get it as well." Samuel said irritably. "So you'd better appreciate it."

Penny reached in her pocket and revealed my wand. I grinned.

"Thanks guys. How did you get that?"

"Piece of cake. The idiots left it in the building." Penny said, feigning nonchalance.

"Can you get me up?" I asked doubtfully.

Penny frowned. "I don't know."

"Maybe we should just take the chair with him in it and work this out later." Rupert said with a smirk. He was a real joker.

Ernie stepped forwards and did something, Merlin knows what but it looked really complicated with all these slashing wand movements. All of a sudden, I was freed. I could move again. I was up instantly, wand in hand, my muscles were screaming in protest but I ignored them. I could take it.

"You're lifesavers." I breathed.

Penny looked smug. "Of course we are."

"We've got your back. We're a unit." Pete said, the first words he'd spoken since he'd arrived.

I half smiled. "Let's get out of here, guys."


	114. Harry and Ginny 11

**A/N: For nikkiw73, Ookami Mononoke, Lupin-n-Tonks and Nymphadora Potter.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Harry x Ginny

It had taken him seventeen years to understand the significance of a gravestone. When he was younger, he hadn't been bothered about where his parents were buried. It didn't matter to him. He didn't need a stone to commemorate their lives.

When he had found their grave, he had changed his mind. The little cemetery meant a lot to him now. It was always chilly there no matter the season and it was a little neglected around the edges but it was the only place in the whole world where his parents were truly with him. No matter the day or the time, he could always feel their presence here. They were here, his parents, Lily and James. They were here.

He visited them a lot now.

He found that talking to them out loud was oddly helpful. Somehow the physical process of just vocalising his thoughts and feelings out loud always made him feel calmer and more level headed. He often worked out any problems he had here as well. He could be more rational as he spoke, could see things from all angles and could, therefore, make a decision. He probably looked a little mad talking to a stone, any passersby would probably think he'd lost his marbles, but he didn't care much. The graveyard was usually deserted anyway.

He stood just behind the gate now. Pulling himself from his thoughts, he pushed the gate open purposefully. It creaked loudly, breaking the early morning silence. He let his feet take him along the familiar path to his parents' grave. He didn't dally today, he didn't have the time to look at the other graves as he so often did or to sit on one of the benches and think about the other people he had lost – Dumbledore, Sirius, Remus.

He sat down in front of the cool, smooth stone. He didn't take the time to read the inscription, he knew it by heart anyway. Morning dew quickly soaked through his jeans but he ignored it.

He always began hesitantly and today was no different. "Hey...Mum, Dad. Hope you're both okay up there." He half smiled – like they could answer him back.

"So, well...erm...you probably already know about it but I thought, well...I wanted you to know that Ginny's had a baby. You're grandparents. Sort of. Anyway. I wish you could meet him." He trailed off, unable to continue for a moment. He so wished his parents could meet their grandchild. Without even knowing them he knew that they would have been good grandparents, the kind that spoiled their grandchildren with contraband sweets, home cooking and lots of love, they would love his son. How could they not? He was perfect. Absolutely perfect.

"We decided to call him James. I don't really need to explain why, I reckon you can guess. I wasn't sure, I'd been thinking about the name for a long time but we'd never discussed it. Me and Ginny, I mean. When he was born, she just looked over and told me he was James. She's got like a sixth sense for these things. He's James Sirius Potter. Think Sirius would have liked that." He grinned knowing the truth of his words. Sirius would have been thrilled.

"He was seven pounds which Ginny reckons is huge. Everyone says he looks like me...like you, Dad...I don't know. I see a lot of Ginny in him and she can't see it. Definitely some Weasley in there though. Something about his nose, I think. Reckon he'll have a lot of freckles as well. Probably be a right little terror as well, with a name like James Sirius he'll have to be. And he's got Uncle Fred and Uncle George for inspiration and a ready supply of products – reckon he might be a better prankster than you and Sirius ever were, Dad." Harry smirked. He could picture Sirius' look of horror at the sheer idea. He couldn't picture his father's face as such but he knew it would be very similar.

"I should probably get back now though. Ginny was still asleep when I left. James was asleep as well. For once. She'll worry if I'm not back though. Well...she probably won't worry at all. I'm the worrier. She's so laidback about it all." This was true. He worried about everything. She was remarkably blasé about things.

He got to his feet and brushed the damp grass from his hands. He touched the top of the gravestone lightly for a second.

As usual, he drew his wand and Transfigured a blade of grass into a bouquet of red flowers. He lay them carefully at the foot of the little stone.

"I'll come back soon. 'Bye." He finished quietly and turned to leave.

He felt their loss most keenly when he left. They could never say goodbye to him. They couldn't respond to the things that he told them. He missed them so much.

He didn't know why he kept coming back. He just knew that whenever something big happened he seemed to find his way here, standing in front of the stone, without even really realising it. And before you knew it, he'd find himself talking out loud, to himself, to the stone, to his parents. He wasn't sure which. He'd come the day after the Final Battle, at dawn, just before the repair of the castle began. He'd come just before he returned to Hogwarts to retake his final year. He'd come again when he'd learned of the marriage law, filled with righteous anger and dread that he might be matched with someone awful, he'd returned to tell them he was engaged to Lavender Brown. He'd told them all about her and how much he still wanted to be with Ginny. He'd come back a few weeks later to tell them he'd gone on the run and was now married to Ginny. Nine months ago, he'd made his way here, filled with joy and practically running, to tell them he was going to be a father.

He knew that they couldn't really hear him. He wasn't delusional or anything, he just liked to believe that maybe they could hear what he was saying.

He Apparated home from just outside the graveyard. He never went to see his former home. Not anymore. Once had been quite enough.

He let himself into 11, Grimmauld Place. He found his wife sitting serenely in an armchair in the living room, their son in her arms. She was still wearing her pyjamas with one of his old jumpers pulled over the top and she had thick socks on her feet. Her hair was still tousled and she looked a little tire

She looked beautiful. He kissed her forehead, murmuring a hello and crouched down to see his son. Their little James. He was all tucked up in a big white shawl, one tiny hand clutching the blanket very tightly. He was awake and looking all around even though he was still too young to actually focus properly.

Their home was very different from the first time they had visited. They had decorated it over one weekend (including the Friday night when it had just been the two of them) and moved in on the Monday. It had been a mammoth task but luckily they had had a lot of volunteers who had offered (or who had been forced by Molly) to help. They'd done it magically. Luna had wanted them to do it the Muggle way (apparently that was how her and George had done their nursery) but there were so many rooms and so little time they had decided to just use magic in the end. On the Sunday night, they had had everyone over for dinner where George and Luna had announced they were planning to go and travel the world. They'd left two weeks later.

The house was much more homely now. It was lighter and brighter and happier. That awful dark, miserable feeling had gone. It felt like a real home.

"Have you been alright?" Harry asked.

Ginny rolled her eyes. "Yes, Harry. I have been fine."

He grinned ruefully. "Sorry, I just can't help but worry about you both."

"Well relax, we're both fine." Her voice turned teasing. "No one around here needs saving so sit down and relax."

He poked his tongue out at her childishly and she pulled a gruesome face right back. Taking her advice, he sat down on the sofa, leaning back and kicking his shoes off.

She got up to join him, tucking herself under his arm, still holding James. He liked times like these the best – the three of them, his little family all together and safe. Moments like these were perfect, he thought contentedly.

"Did you go and tell them?" Ginny asked conversationally. She knew already, of course, she seemed to know him better than he knew himself.

Harry nodded. "Yeah."

"I'm sure that wherever they are, they're thrilled. Can you imagine Sirius' face?"

"He'll be like a kid in a sweetshop." Harry smirked. "And Remus'll be trying to calm him down and Tonks will be hyping him up again. My parents...I...I think they'll be proud." Truthfully, he didn't know what their bvreaction would be. He didn't know them, not really. He liked to think they would be proud though.

There was a companionable silence.

"So I've been thinking..." Ginny began ominously.

"Oh Merlin." Harry teased.

She swatted at his arm. "Listen! Anyway, like I was saying, I've been thinking and I think we should have another baby."

"Now?" He smirked. "Really Ginny, not in front of the baby."

"Oh be quiet." She said good-naturedly. "I didn't mean right now this very second."

"Well when?" Harry said faintly amused.

"Well, James is three months old now. If I was to get pregnant now there would be a year between them, that might be a bit close actually..." She trailed off thoughtfully before adding decisively. "We should probably give it three months."

Harry smirked. "So in three months time, you want to try for another baby."

"Yes." Ginny said firmly, not at all embarrassed. "There's nothing wrong with planning the future."

"No, there isn't." He agreed, pulling her closer. "So tell me...how'd you see our future panning out?"

She grinned. "Well, we've left school now so really we should get jobs at some point. You're going to be an Auror, obviously. And you're training starts next month. You'll be a top Auror, obviously. In three months, we'll try for another baby and then nine months later he or she will be born. I'm kind of hoping for a boy actually. So you'll be climbing the ranks as an Auror, obviously partnered with Ron." She paused to roll her eyes theatrically. "Then we'll have our third baby which will be our girl. We're definitely having a girl so if the third one's a boy, we'll have to have another. Eleven years after that, they'll all be at Hogwarts. Obviously, you will spend your time worrying about them."

"True." Harry said ruefully.

"So I can maybe get a job if I want to. And I probably will want to. I might be too old to play Quidditch by then though. I'll be twenty nine. Which is actually kind of ancient in Quidditch terms. So I don't know what I'll do...maybe coaching. Or administration. Something related to Quidditch anyway. Our kids will progress through Hogwarts. James probably won't be a prefect. Too much of your dad and Sirius in there I reckon. Our second child might be or Lily might be."

Harry nodded wordlessly. They'd never even discussed the possibility of using his parents' names as the names of their children and somehow she just knew that that was what he wanted to do. She was so perfect, she knew him so well.

"And I guess after that, we'll be ancient." She grinned. "Our kids will leave Hogwarts and get jobs and have families of their own and we'll be grandparents. I'll be the coolest granny any child has ever had. And you...well, you'll probably look like a slightly better looking version of Moody."

He blinked disbelievingly. "Only slightly better looking?"

She grinned and leaned in towards him. "Well, maybe more than slightly."

He closed the distance between them quickly and kissed her. He tightened his arms around her and smiled down at his newborn son. Things were just perfect and, if things went the way Ginny had just described, their future together was set to be equally as perfect.

**IMPORTANT: As you may have guessed, this was the very last chapter for Harry and Ginny. I've actually really enjoyed reading about them. They weren't an original couple and, in fact, I never ever planned for them to happen, they just did. They won't feature again now until the epilogue (which is just 13 chapters away!) and as such, ****you can no longer request Harry and Ginny as a couple****.**


	115. Percy and Cho 8

**A/N: For forever12, Moldyshorts and Lucy Whitters. **

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Percy x Cho

It all happened over breakfast. Part of their routine together included eating breakfast together. When he had been living alone, Percy had usually skipped breakfast. He'd always been in a hurry to get to work and breakfast was an unnecessary diversion. He didn't have time to eat, he had work to do. Cho had changed all that. She insisted that breakfast was in fact the most important meal of the day. She'd given this little lecture about it every single day until he finally relented.

She made breakfast every morning. That was her thing. She seemed to enjoy doing it. They'd eat cereal or toast or sometimes muffins, on Sundays they had scrambled egg (something they both loved), and drink coffee or tea. It wasn't fancy fare or anything special, it was just breakfast together. He might even find time to flick through the papers. They'd chat for a bit, if they felt like it or they'd sit quietly and immerse themselves in their own thoughts, if they felt like it. It was a leisurely affair and felt so relaxed even though in reality it was all over in about half an hour. He'd even help her clean up afterwards.

He actually enjoyed the whole thing. He liked being able to relax and go at a more leisurely pace. He liked eating her cooking (which was undeniably good). He liked being able to read the papers or to flick through some paperwork before work. Mostly, however, he liked the feeling of family they both got from the routine. When they were eating breakfast, they sort of felt like a real couple. This was the sort of things proper, in love couples did. Of course, they still didn't have romantic feelings for each other but they were definitely friendly. They talked about everything and argued over differing viewpoints. They teased each other about little things. They were comfortable around each other. They'd even talked about their lack of romantic feelings for each other, agreeing that they were made to be just friends.

It was nice, the feeling of familiarity. It was, as he had suspected, what he imagined living with a roommate was like. It was nice to have someone around as well. He'd always thought he liked living alone but he realised now that he hadn't, truthfully he had always been really quite lonely.

He had thought it might be awkward or uncomfortable living together. It hadn't been. They had adapted to the situation. They'd quickly fallen into a routine which seemed to help. He even made an effort to come home on time because he knew she didn't like to be alone all day. It worked.

It was over breakfast when it happened. Cho was sitting opposite him, as usual, tucking into four slices of toast with butter and strawberry jam. She ate a lot more now that she was pregnant.

She was eight months and two weeks pregnant today and had difficulty with absolutely everything. She couldn't even sit for long periods of time as she got uncomfortable very quickly. He had been taken totally by surprise by the pregnancy – thinking back now, he had no idea why, he knew how babies were made and really a pregnancy was inevitable – and was slowly adapting to the situation. Cho was dealing with it in her own way – brisk, efficient, matter of fact. She didn't like the mood swings though, feeling out of control, even of her own emotions, really shook her up and made her irritable. He'd learned to stay out of her way when she was like that.

He was just reading an article about the slight reduction of security at Gringotts (during the war, the bank had been put on high security, apparently it was just returning to normal) when she said, calm as anything. "My water just broke. I think I'm going to have our baby now."

"Oh. Okay." He replied in an oddly relaxed tone. He felt as if he weren't really here and his voice sounded far off as if someone else was speaking. He blinked and suddenly it all hit home. Merlin! She needed to get to the hospital or something. He needed to take her. Immediately. He dropped the paper quickly and got up, his chair clattering across the floor and breaking the silence.

"Could you get my hospital bag? It's by my side of the bed." She asked placidly. She was still eating her third slice of toast. He half nodded and almost ran up the stairs in his haste.

She smirked. He was panicking. She could see it in his eyes. Percy wasn't really a panicky sort of person. He dealt well with high pressure, high stress situations, his job demanded that he was level headed and cool in a crisis and generally he was. He was definitely freaking out now though. Bless.

Percy reappeared a split second later, faintly wild eyed. "Okay. Let's go. We should go now. Let's...well, did you want to go? I really do think it's time to go. Come on. I...I need to owl the Ministry first. Can I do that from the hospital? Merlin, I don't know. Maybe a Patronus would work just as well. Maybe. Might think something bad has happened though. Oh dear, oh dear, what should we do? I really do think we should go now tho-"

Cho cut off his nervous ramblings sensing that he could go on forever without reaching any kind of conclusion. "My contractions are still four or five minutes apart, at least. I can wait a while. Send an owl to the Ministry first and then we will go to the hospital."

Percy nodded hastily and went on a mad dash around the house in a hunt for some parchment and a quill, knocking things over in his hurry and generally turning the house upside down.

Cho sighed, she'd have to clean that mess up later, and picked up his discarded paper.

It had been an eventful breakfast. Possibly the most eventful breakfast he had ever experienced. And he'd grown up in The Burrow – every moment was eventful, particularly with the twins around.

They had eventually gotten to the hospital. Cho had been incredibly serene during the journey. It changed about twenty minutes after she arrived at the hospital when her contractions really started hitting. She screamed louder than he thought was humanely possible and held his hand far too tightly.

It had been a long labour. It hadn't been complicated particularly, it had just been long. Cho had not been happy. She'd demanded every form of pain relief going and shrieked for probably eighty percent of the time. He'd sat beside her, feeling absolutely useless but trying to appear helpful and knowledgeable, and worried about what to do. Was something wrong? Did he need to do something? Should he go and get a Healer...again?

It had all been worth it in the end though when their baby was placed in her arms. She looked absolutely radiant, glowing. Motherhood suited her. She was evidently made for it. She looked up at him and he'd kissed her forehead and murmured a well done. Tears were shining in her eyes and she looked so very happy. He looked down at their baby and fell instantly, head over heels in love.

It was a little girl. They hadn't even really discussed names so for three days she was just 'Baby'. It had taken them a very long time to eventually settle on a name. Cho had been insistent on one particular name and Percy hadn't been convinced. He'd wanted to look at other names. They had done all of that for two and a half days, weighing up different options, trying the name out alongside their surnames and various middle names before, in the end, deciding to go with Cho's original choice – Madeline.

Little Madeline Molly Weasley was the most beautiful baby he had ever seen. She was a mixture of both him and Cho which really shouldn't've worked but somehow did. She was perfect. She had Cho's dark hair, which she had far more of than he had thought a newborn baby could even have, with his blue eyes and freckles.

She was beautiful. His Maddie. She was quite possibly going to be the most mollycoddled, spoiled child in existence. He couldn't deny her anything. She couldn't even talk yet and he was completely wrapped around her little finger. He even got up in the night to soothe her back to sleep, so that Cho could get some rest.

He loved her so very much. He'd loved her from the second he'd seen her. She was so beautiful, so perfect, so tiny. He wanted to protect her from everything, from anything that might hurt her. She was so little and fragile. The first time he'd held her he'd been scared stiff he might accidentally hurt her, she was so tiny and he felt like a giant beside her. Cho had soothed his worries away and before long he learned to relax a little.

For the first time ever, he had a real reason to be at home as much as possible. He didn't even do overtime anymore. Why would he want to toil away at work when he could be with his Maddie? He worked only his set hours, nine in the morning until five in the evening. He worked just as hard as he ever had but now he just worked when he had to.

That had been six months ago now and he, if it were possible, loved his daughter even more than he had at first.

Whistling tunelessly and smiling in a satisfied fashion, he strolled down his road and let himself in with his door key. The house seemed quiet.

"Hello!" He called, puncturing the silence.

"Hey." Cho yelled back. "We're in the kitchen."

He dumped his bags and his coat in a messy heap in the hallway and made his way to their kitchen. Cho was sitting at the dining table, as immaculately turned out as ever, a pot of tea on the table before her. She was in the process of pouring a second cup out for him.

He smiled at her and kissed her cheek. "Now, where's my girl?" He asked.

Cho grinned. "Waiting for her daddy over there." She pointed behind him.

Maddie was sitting in her high chair, watching him with big blue eyes. She was dressed head to toe in pink.

"Hello pretty girl." He crooned, sweeping her up out of the chair and into his arms. He kissed the tip of her nose and she gurgled in delight. He took his seat at the table, Maddie tucked neatly on his lap.

"How's your day been?" Cho asked, pushing the cup of tea towards him.

He took it gratefully and recounted some of his day to her. It had been a day like any other "And how has yours been?"

She bit her lip and cast her eyes downward.

"What's wrong?" He asked, a concerned furrow appearing between his eyebrows.

"Well, I...I got some news today."

"What's wrong?" He repeated in a more frantic tone this time, instinctively clutching Maddie a little tighter.

"I'm pregnant." She whispered. Her eyes were tightly shut like she was holding back tears or like she didn't want to meet his eyes.

"Really? You're pregnant?"

She nodded once.

A grin broke across his face. "Really? This...this is fantastic!" And he was telling the truth. He couldn't wait for another baby, another beautiful little baby girl perhaps or maybe a boisterous little boy. He didn't care which. He would love their child no matter what.

"You're pleased?" She asked softly. He couldn't get a read on her expression.

"Yes." He said instantly and truthfully. "Aren't you?"

"Yes. Yeah. I am. I just...well, I didn't...I didn't think you would be happy." She said quickly, looking a little embarrassed.

He reached across the table to take her hands. "I love Maddie and I do love you, not in the conventional way but I do love you. You're my best friend and I couldn't think of anyone who would be a better mother to my children. I can't believe we're having another baby. I'm thrilled. Thrilled." He repeated for emphasis.

She smiled shyly back at him. "Promise?"

"Promise."

**A/N: Yet another final chapter I'm afraid, this couples story has come to an end now. I'll admit that at first I didn't particularly enjoy writing Percy and Cho but somehow along the way I've grown to like them. They have a completely different relationship from any other couple and it's sort of grown on me! Let me know what you think - read, review and request.**

**I will no longer be accepting requests for Percy and Cho.**


	116. Dean and Lavender 5

**A/N: For spring butterfly, Afrenchgirl and Rueflowersmall and delicate.**

**I go back to school tomorrow so I might not have the time to update as frequently as I have been recently. Just keep with me, I promise the story will get finished (and probably quite soon!). **

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Dean x Lavender

It wasn't that she hadn't wanted a baby. It was more that she hadn't wanted a baby yet. That probably didn't make a lot of sense.

She had always wanted to be a mother ever since she was a little girl. She'd dreamed about having the perfect family – loving husband and adoring, beautiful children. She hadn't ever expected it would happen when she was so young though. Yes, wizards and witches did marry and reproduce young but she was only nineteen. She wasn't sure she was ready to be a mum. She wasn't sure she was able to be a mum. Mothers were supposed to be good people and she wasn't sure how good she was.

Besides, she liked her life as it was now. This was her dream lifestyle and she wasn't sure she was ready to give it up just yet.

Her life now was relaxed, laid back, calm. She did whatever she wanted to do whenever she felt like doing it. There was no routine to her days. She got up whenever she felt like it, although she usually got up when Dean did, ate breakfast, usually with Dean, and showered. She'd get dressed and then decide what to do for the day. Sometimes she journeyed into Diagon Alley and browsed the shops for an hour or two before meeting Dean for lunch (he was working in Quality Quidditch Supplies). Sometimes she would go over to Parvati's and she'd dote over the twins (who were actually her goddaughters as well) and chat with Parvati over who was having a baby and who'd already had one and what they were called. Sometimes she'd just stay in and tidy up a bit or cook some dinner ready for when Dean got home or watch rubbish Muggle television all day. When Dean got home, they'd eat dinner together before usually going straight up to bed. Sometimes they managed to delay long enough to sit together in the living room for a while; usually they didn't make it that long.

It was perfect. It was the kind of life that people dream about. It was sort of over now though. There was no way she could continue like this with a baby in tow. Babies needed routine and structure. They were demanding. They demanded time and attention and love and feeding and care and bathing. She wouldn't be so relaxed and leisurely with a baby added into the equation.

And yet, she did want to be a mum. She was thrilled that she and Dean were having a baby. It was like a dream come true. However, the excitement was tempered with a slight hint of regret.

She'd never have Dean all to herself ever again. She was so in love with him, they were so good together. Was it so selfish that she just wanted to spend as much time with him as possible?

It probably was selfish. She'd be sharing him with their child – their child! – it wasn't like sharing him with some other woman. It would be their child. She would undoubtedly love this child – she loved him or her already and she'd only known she was pregnant for approximately fifteen minutes. No child would be more loved than this one.

She had just wanted her and Dean to be able to be a young married couple for as long as was humanely possible. You only got to do that once, they'd only had a few months and already things were set to change. Before long they would no longer be a blissfully in love, time rich, young married couple. They would be a young married couple with a newborn baby, hardly any money, existing on four hours sleep each night and permanently covered in baby sick and snot and Merlin knows what else. Would things still be the same then?

She had vowed to love Dean in sickness and in health, for richer, for poorer, for better and for worse. And she meant it. She meant to stick by it. But would things really be the same with a baby. Could they still be as in love as they were now, still want each other as much as they did now, still find each other so absolutely perfect when they were tired and grumpy (from the lack of sleep) and drained?

Was that so selfish of her? Maybe it was. Selfishness was something she tried very hard to avoid these days. Before Dean she had been a selfish person. She'd also been greedy and mean and a generally nasty person. She was trying to be a better person now. It was mostly for him. He was such a good person, he deserved someone good, someone who'd never deliberately pushed away her best friends or been an utter cow to the Chosen One, and she was trying so hard to be a better person for him.

She just loved him so much. Perhaps too much. Sometimes the intensity of her love for him scared her. She wondered if it was really supposed to be like that – so intense, so all consuming, so massive. She thought it should be like that. Probably.

She heard a key click in the door, shaking her from her thoughts. Dean was home. She hurried to meet him, flinging herself at him the split second he walked through the door. Luckily he caught her. He had good reflexes.

"Woah, what did I do to deserve this?" He teased, a lazy smile splashed across his face as usual.

She pulled away. "Just...well, I'll tell you in a minute."

He nodded, curiosity evident on his face, and pulled his jacket off, slinging it over the banister and slipping his shoes off. She automatically picked his jacket back up, folded it neatly over her arm and placed it back where it had been before. He smirked at the little adjustment. It was a habit of hers, one she found very hard to kick - she tended to tidy. She'd go around, tidying up behind people. Half the time she didn't even realise she was doing it. It drove Parvati mad. She liked to think Dean found it endearing.

She tugged on his hand impatiently, pulling him into their living room and pushing him down onto the sofa.

"I have something to tell you." She announced.

He nodded. "Okay." He sounded...a little wary. He seemed to have no idea what she was on about.

"I'm pregnant." She said. She dropped her gaze, feeling a little awkward all of a sudden. She wasn't usually awkward in front of him but all of sudden she wanted to cover her face and hide. There was nothing but silence. Her mind was racing wondering what he was thinking, what he was doing, whether he was happy about it or not. She just had to look, peeking up from under her lashes ready to drop her gaze at any second, Dean appeared to be frozen. He wasn't moving at all.

As she watched, his mouth moved but no noise came out. He seemed to be talking to himself. Oh Merlin. He wasn't happy. Maybe he hadn't even wanted kids, oh Merlin...

Suddenly, his whole face changed and he was beaming at her, getting up very quickly, crossing the space between them in two strides and pulling her into his arms. He kissed her and she smiled against his lips. She could feel his lips twitch up in response.

He was happy. He was pleased about it. She could hardly keep the grin off of her face. She had been, for a split second, worried that he didn't want this, didn't want a baby, didn't want her.

She still couldn't get her head around the fact that he loved her. Her! Why would he? She wasn't a good person. She didn't deserve someone like him and he deserved far better. And yet, he did love her. He had chosen to love her.

He cupped her face in his hands and kissed her forehead tenderly. Her eyes fluttered closed.

"I'm gonna be a Daddy." He whispered awestruck.

She giggled and nodded. "Yeah. You are." Her voice came out pathetically breathy. He just had that effect on her. She couldn't even speak normally when he was holding her.

"Wow." He said again ever so quietly as if he still couldn't quite believe it. She got it. She wasn't quite sure she believed it herself yet.

"I know. I can't believe it. We're having a baby. We are."

He half smiled. "Of course we are, love."

"I just never expected it to happen to...to me."

He sighed teasingly. "Well why wouldn't it? If anyone deserves a baby, it's you."

She didn't say anything just continued fidgeting uncomfortably. She didn't deserve a baby. She wasn't a good person and only good people really deserved to have a baby.

His hands slid down to her waist and he pulled her even closer to him. When he spoke, his voice was low and fierce. "Listen to me. I know you think you're a bad person because you made a few mistakes a long time ago. I don't care about that. No one cares about that. You've more than made up for it, okay? You are a good person, in fact you're one of the best people I know. I love you more than anything else in the world, okay, and I can't stand seeing you so low. You're perfect. I promise."

She blinked back tears which had suddenly found their way into her eyes. She couldn't doubt the sincerity of his words, he obviously believed what he was saying, she could see it in his eyes, in his voice, in his every gesture. Maybe she wasn't such a bad person. Maybe she had made up for it now. Perhaps she really did deserve to be with someone like him. Perhaps.

"You really think so?" She asked in a low voice.

He chuckled and kissed the tip of her nose. "I really think so."

"And you really are happy that we're having a baby?"

"I don't think I've ever been so happy in my life, sweetheart."

"I love you." She was overwhelmed by the moment, by the intensity of her love for him, by the sheer joy she was feeling and she just had to tell him. She never wanted him to doubt how much she loved him. She loved him and she'd never stop loving him, they were meant to be together. She wouldn't let them fall apart like so many other couples did. She wouldn't. Having a baby would enhance and strengthen their relationship. She was sure of it.

He grinned. "I love you too, Lavender."

**A/N: This is the last chapter for Dean and Lavender. They will be in the epilogue of course, but they can no longer be requested.**

**Here is a list of the couples you can still request, just to refresh your memories!  
- Draco and Katie  
- Neville and Hannah  
- Ron and Padma  
- Blaise and Hermione  
- Oliver and Alicia  
- Fred and Angelina  
- Lee and Pansy**


	117. Neville and Hannah 8

**A/N: For missb14 and Nymphadora Potter.**

**Okay, I got 18 reviews for my last chapter. 18! (I was so excited I nearly screamed.) As a little reward and because I love you all very much (yes, actual love) here's the next chapter, much sooner than I expected. Hope you enjoy it.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Neville x Hannah

Sometimes when she had a rare free moment she would sit down and think. Just think. Thinking time was a luxury these days. Every second of the day she seemed to be needed, she never had a moment to just sit back and think. When she did manage it, her thoughts were usually bleak. She wondered what her life had become. What she had become.

When she had become this person, this bitter, angry harpy who didn't even know how to smile anymore? (She couldn't even remember the last time she had even wanted to smile. Laughter was a distant memory.) How had she ended up like this?

She didn't even recognise herself anymore. When she looked in the mirror, an unfamiliar frowning face glared back at her, deep deep lines carved into it's forehead and it's eyes were cold and dark and unhappy. It was a face that didn't smile often or laugh, a face that didn't know happiness or joy. Was that her?

And when she snapped at someone – Neville usually or sometimes even a particularly rowdy or demanding customer at the bar – she would wince internally and wonder who she was and why she was behaving like this. Why couldn't she be the old Hannah anymore?

The old Hannah was shy and sweet and smiling. The old Hannah giggled and grinned and wouldn't say boo to a goose. This Hannah was bitter and angry, so very angry.

Why couldn't she just be happy?

Neville was getting better now. He got up every single day and he spoke almost normally and he ate three meals a day. He even managed to venture out of the house every now and then. She should feel happy about that. She couldn't summon up enough energy to care.

Truth was she was just used up. She didn't have anything left to give. She'd been working hard for months, pushing herself to her limits, struggling to make it through each day and now she was used up. She didn't have any love or affection or time to spare on anybody. It was all used up. There was nothing left. Nothing at all.

She'd used it all up on begging Neville to wake up and trying to hold together the family home on her single salary and working all hours of the day and night to try and boost her meagre pay package and trying to keep herself in good enough shape that the baby would stay healthy.

And that was where pretty much all of her love went - on the baby. The baby was the one person in her life who had never let her down, who never made any demands on her time or affection, who didn't want her to be anything in particular.

She didn't have any love to spare on anybody else – all on the baby, a fraction on her great uncle Tom who'd given her the job at his bar and a minimal amount on Neville because deep down she still did care about him.

She did care. Really she did. She was still in love with him. Of course she was. How could she not be? He was still Neville. He wasn't the man she had fallen in love with, not anymore, but then she wasn't the same Hannah he had married. They weren't the same people anymore. Tragedy and grief had torn them apart, changed them, perhaps for the worse. And things weren't the same anymore. They could never be the same again.

She just was so mad with him she couldn't bring herself to be nice to him. Her anger at him was so stupidly petty as well. She understood why he had been so withdrawn for so long. He had been depressed for Merlin's sakes and she was mad at him. What kind of person was she?

She was mad at someone who was clinically depressed because the last remaining member of their family had slipped away from this world. She was sick. She was messed up. She was Merlin awful.

Just what was wrong with her? Why couldn't she let go of all this anger?

She just wanted to be her again. Plain old Hannah Abbott who worried about everything and who wasn't known for being especially strong and who hadn't fallen hopelessly in love with Neville.

If she hadn't loved Neville so much, she might not have stayed. When he got really really bad, she had seriously considered leaving. It hadn't just affected him; it had gotten to her too. She'd had days where all she had wanted to do was to curl up in a ball and rock and cry. She had even had a day or two where she had done just that. She just hadn't been able to cope. She'd tried so hard to stay strong and to be a good person and to let him grieve and she just hadn't been able to keep it all up.

Neville thought she had been so strong, so brave, so loyal. She hadn't been. She'd broken down so many times. She'd just kept it from him sensing that her visible distress would only tip him further over the edge. She'd been so scared the whole time – scared for him, for his safety, for his wellbeing, for herself, for their baby. She hadn't even been particularly loyal. She'd told people about his condition, tried to get them to try and persuade him to get some help. She'd even considered leaving. Several times. Maybe it counted for something that she hadn't left...perhaps. She hadn't left him even when things got really tough and even on the darkest days, she had been there. She had always been there.

She had tried to get him help. At first, she had understood that he wanted to be at home in familiar surroundings with people he loved nearby. She thought that that might even help him recover quicker. Then she had realised that what he had wasn't normal, healthy grieving. It was something far darker and scarier. She had tried to persuade him to go into hospital just for a little while. She had been so scared that he might do something stupid and if he had done, it would have been her fault. She couldn't have that responsibility. She didn't want it. If he was in hospital, surrounded by trained professionals who knew how to deal with this sort of thing, receiving the very best care available, then she could breathe easy. He hadn't gone. At first he had simply refused, then he had shouted his refusal and then he had locked himself in the bathroom until she gave up.

He had worn her down with his stubbornness. In the end she had just given up and let him be. She'd given up hoping that today would be the day, today he would get up, today he would be okay because it was never going to be that day. She'd given up.

She was so worn out. So sick of everything. She couldn't find it within herself to be happy anymore. Happiness was tiring and required effort and she didn't time for that. Didn't have the energy required for that.

All she had time for was her baby. Her baby. Oh Merlin. Her unborn baby was the only thing that stopped her from giving up entirely. She was nearly eight months pregnant. Just over a month until her baby made its' way into the world. She didn't want to bring her baby into a world where his or her father was clinically depressed and found it hard to even leave the house. She had to face the facts that that was exactly what was going to happen. However, she refused, point blank refused, to bring her baby into a world where its' father was like that and then it's mother was lifeless and drained and ever so tired. She couldn't. That was not going to happen to her baby.

It wasn't.

She leaned back against the kitchen counter. The cool laminate surface dug into her back. She didn't have the energy to move. She clutched a half empty mug of tea in both hands. Her hands were pale and thin and bony. They were horrible. She closed her eyes so she didn't have to look at them and took a gulp of her tea. She fidgeted slightly with discomfort as her baby moved inside her. She concentrated solely on breathing in and out calmly. She found that that usually helped.

It all happened quite quickly. Her water broke and she very suddenly became aware that her trousers were soaked through and that the discomfort was getting worse and that she was going into labour. Merlin. She needed to get to the hospital or something. She had to move. Had to call Neville. Had to get away from here. Had to get to doctors, to someone, anyone, who could help her.

Her mind was screaming one thing. Repeating itself. Hysteria creeping in.

_Not yet. It's too soon. Not yet. It's too soon. Not yet. It's too soon._


	118. Draco and Katie 13

**A/N: A very requested Draco and Katie for nikkiw73, Lady Eleanor Boleyn, lovenotwar, Lupin-n-Tonks, PintoNess, christy86, Bri P., ginnyweasleyrules, The giant purple squirrel, jeweltheif500, imaanikinz1044 and crazy's wat i aim 4.**

**I am so sorry it's been so long. I just couldn't work out how to write this, this is my third attempt and I went with a whole different tense because it just felt right this way. I hope you like it!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

You've never been so tired in your whole life. You are just absolutely completely physically exhausted. You don't get much sleep and you spend all your waking hours rushing around frantically like a headless chicken. Your darling little Clio, as beautiful and lovely and undoubtedly intelligent as she is, does not seem to realise that most people need eight hours of uninterrupted sleep to function properly as a normal human being.

Oh yes, you had a girl. You're first born Malfoy heir had been a girl. Narcissa had been stunned speechless. Draco had smirked. You had grinned in a smug fashion and cuddled your little Clio close. Take that Malfoys, take that...

And just about when you are so tired you think you might collapse with sheer exhaustion, Draco will walk through the door and sweep Clio into his own arms and tell you to go and sit down for a while or to have a nap. Usually, you oblige. Sleep is sleep and you take whatever you can get.

He is like your knight in shining armour. He always seems to know exactly when you have reached your limits and then he'd dive in and help you out.

He is a good father, you have to admit that. Clio dotes on him and he is always so gentle and so loving and so unbelievably tender with his little girl. He is a spoiled brat though and doesn't even know how to make a bed and yet no task regarding the baby is too lowly for him. He's even changed her nappy a few times (admittedly, you did have to force him into doing that and he had complained for hours afterwards but he has still done it).

It's times like those when you wonder how you have ever gotten to this point. You always hated him on principal at school and when you first really know him you'd loathed him because of how he was and what he was and because you were being forced into marrying him and you hate being told what to do and you hated him and you hated, hated, hated. But now, things are very different. Somehow, very slowly and almost stealthily, he's become this huge part of your life and you can't even remember what life was like before him.

He's your husband. What is more he is trying to be a good husband. He's said before that he would try and live up to the role and he has been. He does actually care for you, in his own way. He's never said so in as many words but then neither have you.

You don't understand your own feelings for him. They are scary and unfamiliar and like nothing else you have ever experience before. You don't even know how to put them into words. You don't understand how you could ever feel like this about someone, particularly when that someone is Draco Malfoy.

He is Draco Malfoy for Merlin's sakes. How can you feel like this about him?

You are supposed to hate him. He is a former Death Eater and he believed in blood superiority and he is unbelievably arrogant. You shouldn't like him. You just shouldn't.

But you do.

You can't help who you fall in love with.

Wait. Love? You don't love him. No one has ever mentioned the 'l' word before. You absolutely do not love him. You can't.

You just like him. He's generous and can be kind, he's intelligent and isn't afraid to disagree with you, he is undeniably handsome and he is a really good father. In fact, he's even a pretty good husband.

He's even bought you your very own house. It's just as you had expected – Draco doesn't do understated. It's a townhouse located in a very expensive, and very lovely, part of London. It's beautiful, of course, and he's had it all redecorated in shades of white and cream. It's your dream house. You even have your very own library right at the top of the house next door to the nursery. You don't have much there at the moment but you're planning on buying some more furniture and building up an impressive book collection. You even have two house elves – you hadn't really been that bothered about having them but Draco had insisted so that you don't have to do all the housewife stuff by yourself – and they are a godsend. You have no idea how you would have ever coped without them.

You even share a bedroom in your new house. Traditionally, Pureblood couples don't share. They each have their own suite of luxurious rooms.

Neither of you had even discussed it. When nightfall came, you both went to the master bedroom in a silent acknowledgement that this would be your room. It didn't feel as odd as you has thought it might. The first night had been a little awkward and you'd tossed and turned all night, unused to another's presence in your bed, particularly that of Draco Malfoy. You got over it pretty quickly and now it's familiar and seems only right, natural even.

Clio stirs slightly drawing you back to the present and you fidget a little, adjusting her weight in your arms. She's a sturdy little thing – apparently a Malfoy baby trait. She's undeniably beautiful. She looks a lot like her father as well with his pale complexion and traces of white blonde hair.

"Alright, my little princess?" You croon softly to your baby. Clio stares up at you with wide blue eyes.

"Well I'm great thank you, but can you not call me your little princess, sweetheart?" Draco enters the room, smirking as usual, his eyes twinkling with mischief.

"Can't promise anything, princess." You reply cheekily. You feel the corners of your mouth twitch up in a smile. You can't even help it. It's just the effect he has on you.

Draco sits next to you, crosses his legs manfully and reaches for his daughter. You had her over carefully and edge a little closer to watch the two of them – your daughter and your husband – together. He casually lifts one arm and drapes it across your shoulders, uniting you all as a family.

You wonder again how you have gotten to this stage. You hated each other, loathed each other even, and now you're so laid back, so comfortable with each other.

And you like him. You like being around him. He makes you smile like no one else does. You feel better when he is with you – calmer and happier. He makes you feel like you can be anything at all.

You are discovering new things about him, just little things. The sort of things that only come with living together, things you've never known before and things you suspect that very few other people know.

Like how he absolutely hates bananas. Like how he's actually a really good cook despite having every single meal of his life cooked for him by house elves. Like how he is actually fiercely intelligent. Like how he's an excellent businessman. Like how he has a really nice smile even though he very rarely smiles. Like how he dotes on his little girl.

"How has your day been?" You ask.

"Fine, I guess. Tedious though. Father wants to resume control of the business but he has no idea what he's doing. He just wants the authority without doing any of the work." His relationship with his father is unusual – they're close, very close, and yet there is a lot of tension there and their relationship balances uneasily. One tiny little mishap and it is all going to go up in flames.

"I always did think that you didn't know what you were doing." You comment truthfully. You'd always thought that he just relied on the people around him do the work that he could not, or would not, do. You'd been wrong. Draco is an active member of the business and works very hard.

"That's because you always wanted to think the worst of me."

"True." You accept that readily enough. It's completely true. You always wanted to hate him and to do that you always had to portray him in the worst light possible.

"See, I'm not that bad really."

You smirk. "I guess you're okay really...kind of."

"You love me really."

It was a slip of the tongue. Panic appears in his eyes as he realises what he has said and you stutter frantically. "N-no. I don't."

You've never mentioned love before. He's never said it and you haven't either.

So maybe you do love him, just a little bit, but you're denying it to yourself because you just can't love him. Draco Malfoy is not a loveable person. You don't even know if he loves you. He's never said it and you can't just assume that that means he does.

You understand why he hasn't. He's part of a world where love is something that only exists in fairytales and were marriages are arranged like business deals in order to gain something – money, power, an alliance. He will never be able to tell you he loves you because he isn't physically capable of such a thing.

He might love you but he won't be able to tell you. He won't be able to say those three words and until he does, you're not saying them.

You will not let yourself be the first one to break. You have more dignity than that and you're so sick of him always winning. It's your turn to win and he will admit he loves you first (and he does love you, you can tell). You will not say anything until he does and if that means you have to wait forever to hear those three little words, then so be it. You can't give in first.

You're a proud, stubborn person and your pride won't let you give in and say it. You just can't. You can't even manage to reconcile yourself to the fact that you're in love with Draco sodding Malfoy.

You can't break first. You won't let yourself.

"My Mother wants to visit tomorrow." He says casually, trying to recreate the formerly pleasant atmosphere.

You shrug non-comitaly. You don't want to entertain his cold, bland mother and if she comes then his awful father might tag along and you're not having that.

"Come on...let her visit, you know she adores Clio."

Your nose wrinkles a fraction. "I know."

"Go on, don't make me beg."

You snort unattractively but he doesn't even bat an eyelid. "Draco Malfoy...begging for something, now that is something I'd like to see." You tease him lightly (in the back of your mind you are astounded that you have reached the point where you can tease each other and laugh with each other).

"Well, perhaps I used the wrong wording there...not begging exactly. Malfoys do not beg. I could ask nicely, however." His tone is laced with sarcasm.

"Can you really be nice?" You ask in a vaguely disbelieving tone. You're only joking of course. He is nice.

He shifts slightly so he is facing you and lifts the hands that was draped over your shoulders to cup your face gently, manouerving so that Clio is barely jostled throughout the whole process. He stares deep into your eyes and you stare right back cursing yourself for being so affected by him. You're staring back into his grey eyes and you're drowning in them. You never want to look away. When he speaks, his voice is low and earnest and warms you. "Katie...Katie, my darling, please can my Mother visit tomorrow so that she can visit her beloved granddaughter and daughter in law?" He delivers the killstrike. "For me."

You can deny him nothing like this. How can you? He's mesmerising. He's sincere and loving and unbelievably handsome. You move closer so you're pressed against him and lock your hands behind his neck. You kiss him. "Absolutely." You whisper pressing your forehead against his.

He smirks arrogantly. "Knew I could do it."

"Jerk." You mutter kissing him again. He's gentle and tender and you can feel smile against your lips.

You are absolutely clear about five things. Firstly, you are absolutely madly in love with him. Secondly, you shouldn't love him because he is Draco Malfoy but you do and you're coming to terms with that. Thirdly, he loves you just as much as you love him, perhaps more. Fourthly, he will never admit it to you, he just isn't physically capable of doing it.

And lastly, you don't care. Why should she? She didn't really need to hear those three little words, not when she knew so absolutely that he was in love with her, not when every single word he said to her or every gesture was laced with the love he felt for her.

They were head over heels in love and neither would ever admit it. And that was okay.

**IMPORTANT: I absolutely love these two so it saddens me to say this but this is the very last Draco and Katie chapter. Look out for them in the epilogue – just 8 chapters away now! Please keep reading, reviewing and requesting. Thank you.**


	119. Blaise and Hermione 14

**A/N: For missb14, Lady Eleanor Boleyn, juniperwing, PintoNess, christy86 and ginnyweasleyrules.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Blaise x Hermione

Lady Luck had definitely deserted her. In fact, Luck was pretty much running away from her screaming and then pointing and laughing maliciously at her from a distance. Why was this happening to her? Why? She'd been a good person. She'd never done anything so awful she deserved this. Had she?

She was pregnant. Again.

Theodore was only three months old and she was already pregnant with his brother or sister. She blamed Zabini. It was obviously something to do with him. He seemed determined to knock her up as frequently as was humanely possible. The Pureblooded egotistical idiotic big headed jerk.

Theodore wouldn't even be two years old when his baby brother or sister emerged into this world. How on earth was she going to cope?

She liked to think of herself as a good, capable mum, but would she be able to manage with two tiny babies still so very dependent on her? Of course she would have help but sometimes a family friend wasn't really enough. What she needed was a husband. Luckily, she already had one. Unfortunately, he was Blaise sodding Zabini and she hated every single thing about him. She couldn't ask him for help. His solution would be to hand her babies over to a nanny or something. Or he would want to look after them himself and that was absolutely not happening, never in a million years.

And where would she live? She could just about get away with her and Theodore living at The Burrow. Molly had invited her too and she genuinely seemed to enjoy having the pair of them around.

But space was tight – there was no way she could have two children living here with her. It wasn't even her house. There just wasn't space for them all. Admittedly, a lot of people were moving out now so it would soon be Molly and Arthur. But she couldn't stay with them, she couldn't encroach on their hospitality any longer. They had been more than generous and now they needed some time alone, just the two of them, they deserved it.

What was she going to do?

Not for the first time she cursed the Ministry for all they had done, for all the problems they had created, for all the lives they had ruined.

Just this week they had announced that no further couples would be subject to the marriage law. It was only their age group. No one else would be subjected to forced marriages, which was admittedly good and yet, she couldn't help but be furiously jealous. This coddled generation hadn't even fought in the war; they'd been safe at Hogwarts and on top of that got to fall in love with whomever they wanted. How was that fair? The government, the Ministry, had really betrayed her generation.

None of this, however, solved her current problems. (Although, being rude about the Ministry never failed to make her feel a tiny bit better.)

A knock on the door cut through her tangle of worried thoughts. For once, she was entirely alone in the house so she rose to answer the door.

"Blaise?" Her voice was high with surprise.

"Yes. Erm...sorry for the lack of notice, I was just passing by...thought I might drop in." He said. He seemed almost nervous, perhaps he was worried about the reception he would receive or something.

"Well, come in." She said begrudgingly, stepping aside to allow him entry. "Theodore's asleep but he'll probably wake up in a moment."

"Is it...is anyone else here?" He asked bluntly. He seemed worried as he stepped over the threshold. He didn't like being here; it probably felt like enemy territory to him. He never liked encountering any other member of the Weasley family or Harry – they were never especially polite and often harsh words were exchanged.

"No. It's just me and Theodore." She said over her shoulder, already walking towards the living room. "Please, sit." She gestured vaguely to the sofa. She took a seat in the armchair and watched him quite openly. What did he want? He never turned up unannounced. She hoped he wasn't going to start making a habit of it.

"Well...how have you been?"

"I've been fine. So has Theodore, he still wakes up a lot though." She said quietly. In a subconscious movement, she curled her legs up underneath her almost defensively.

"Good. That's good."

There was a short pause before she blurted out her news. "I'm pregnant."

"What?" Blaise blinked in a stunned fashion.

"I'm pregnant." She repeated slowly as if he were especially stupid.

"I didn't...I didn't even know you could get pregnant again so quickly."

She rolled her eyes. He was such a man. "Well unfortunately I can."

"Well, that's good news at any rate. Maybe it'll be a girl this time." He sounded pleased and hopeful. He sounded exactly like she was supposed to sound. She wasn't pleased though or hopeful. She was worried and tired and afraid.

"Perhaps." Hermione said non commitally. She absolutely refused to do baby talk with the father of her child whom she absolutely loathed. Why couldn't he just leave? Didn't he realised he was unwelcome here? She wished someone would hurry up and come home; Molly had said she was only popping out for an hour or two. Where on earth was she?

"Will you remain staying here?"

"I don't know." She replied truthfully. "I don't know if I can."

"I hardly think they will ask you to leave." He prompted, an eyebrow raised. Clearly, he was digging around for information. She wasn't quite sure why though – what was he getting at?

"Of course they won't." She scoffed. "But Molly and Arthur are getting older now, having two babies in the house will probably be too much for them and they're already letting me live here rent free, I can't ask them for anything else. I guess I'll have to find somewhere else."

"Then let me reinstate my offer to you, I am willing to buy you a house wherever you want for you and our children." She didn't like the way he said that – 'our children' – that implied they were together in something, joined somehow.

She drew her attention back to him and his proposal. She didn't know what to say. On the one hand, it would be nice to have her own place and she knew that she couldn't impose on the Weasley family for much longer. She could get a place nearby so she wasn't too far away. It was sort of sweet that he would do that for her as well.

On the other hand, she was loath to accept anything from him at all. She didn't want to live in the house he had bought her – that would mean she owed him and that he could kick her out at any time at all. He'd have something he could hold over her for the rest of her life. And it was so easy living here; she had a constant supply of help. People were always dropping in. It was nice living with the Weasley family.

"That would be nice, thank you." She said, surprising both herself and him. In the end, she had decided on one very simple argument – it would be better for her children if they had their own house. She would be a fool to turn down his very generous offer just to spite him.

He recovered himself almost instantly. "Of course, you choose the house and let me know. I don't care what it's like, money is no problem. Only the best for my children."

She nodded. "Okay. Thank you."

"No problem. Technically, you are my wife. It's only my duty to provide you with somewhere to live." He sounded almost genuine. Slimy, sly little Slytherin.

He paused. "Do you know how far you along you are? With the pregnancy I mean."

She shook her head. "Not yet, they'll be able to tell me more when I go for my first scan. I don't think it's very far along though."

He nodded and paused. When he spoke his words were rushed and jumbled and tangled. He was nervous. That was sort of sweet. "Do...well, this is kind of awkward but...do you, I mean would you mind...if I came with you?"

_Yes, I would actually._ "No, if you want to be there you can." He was technically the father. She couldn't deny him this. She may have been a lot of things but she was not a spiteful person.

"Really?" He was shocked. "I mean, thank you."

"I'll owl you when I know the date." She said stiffly.

There was another short pause.

"You really hate me, don't you?" He was grinning, leaning back in his chair, the very picture of ease. In contrast, she was curled up in her seat, hunched forward uncomfortably.

"N-no...yes." She admitted. She was not a gifted liar.

He smirked at her confirmation. "I hated you too. But I don't so much anymore."

"Why?" She asked curiously. She had always thought that their feelings for each other were mutual loathing, nothing more nothing less.

"Because I find it distasteful to hate the mother of my child." He said smoothly. He sounded almost disappointed. Clearly, he had wanted to despise her.

"Sorry?"

"It's okay." He smirked again. His tone turned serious again and frankly quite disturbed. "Don't go thinking I actually like you or anything, because that would definitely be an overstatement." His nose wrinkled just a fraction.

"God no." She said in an equally horrified tone. "You really love Theodore, don't you?"

"More than anything." He replied seriously. "I never expected to feel like I do and yet, I am so glad that I do feel this way. I am glad I have him in my life, that's why I can't hate you. How can I hate you when you brought Theodore to me?"

The utter sincerity in his voice won her over, just a little. "You could have him to stay for a whole weekend. If you wanted to." She hadn't intended to let Theodore stay over until he was much much older but there was no denying that Blaise had earned that much. She was tired of it all now, their stupid petty little battles. She didn't need to beat him, to win. It didn't matter who won anymore, what were they even fighting over? She couldn't remember, perhaps she had never known. And what would the prize be? Their son? Was she really that low that she sought to won her own son's love? Could she not bring herself to share him? She didn't need to have this to hold over Blaise. She was sick of it all.

They were calling a truce and this was her white flag.

"Really?" His voice was ever so hopeful but tinged with disbelief.

"Yes." She said quietly. "He will not grow up not knowing his father properly. I personally can't stand the sight of you or your Merlin awful mother but...well, he might. He might not grow up thinking the same as I do and I cannot impose my views on him. Of course, I am desperately hoping that you'll mess up somewhere along the line and he'll be a...convert, but I'll never push him into it. That wouldn't be fair to him." Her voice turned wry at the end, the corners of her mouth twitching up very slightly.

Blaise threw his head back and chuckled. "Touche Granger... and you can bet your life that I've got my fingers crossed for the very same thing."

"I hate you." She said pleasantly, smiling faintly.

"I thoroughly dislike you." He countered, grinning as well.

And that was exactly the way things were meant to be. They'd never be in love, in fact they would probably never even like each other, but that was just the way they were and it would all be okay.

**IMPORTANT: Another final chapter here guys. I hadn't meant to write this, I was supposed to write Lee and Pansy but I just felt very inspired to write this... Lee and Pansy is next, if I manage to get over my writer's block. This is the very last Blaise and Hermione chapter, look out for them in the epilogue (which is so close I can practically touch it!). I feel like I might have disappointed a lot of people by not having them end up together but I don't think it would have been very realistic if they'd suddenly fallen madly in love. Sorry, this is one couple that are just destined to hate each other! **

**Please keep reviewing and requesting – I know I always say it but it really does make my day.**


	120. Lee and Pansy 7

**A/N: For Ookami Mononoke, pistachio53 and missb14. A very short little snapshot on how Pansy is doing!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Lee x Pansy

Living in France was exactly as she had expected it would be.

At home she had been welcomed and accepted and someone who fitted in. Here she was ostracised, a freak, the weird English girl.

She had very few opportunities to socialise – Aunt Alice was an elderly lady now, she preferred afternoon naps and quiet evenings in before retiring to bed at nine o'clock on the dot rather than fancy balls or parties which went into the early hours – and there was a huge language barrier. She spoke very little French. People swore that total immersion was the best way to learn the language but it definitely wasn't working for her. Her very limited French was hindered by her terrible accent. Everyone she even attempted to speak to just regarded her with bemused, or apathetic, expressions. Aunt Alice was even considering hiring her a tutor she spoke so little of the language.

She wasn't even able to go out with Aunt Alice. At home, she had a wide circle of friends and so could go somewhere with any one of them. Over here she had no friends whatsoever and so had no one to go anywhere with. She spent most of her time alone doing not very much and pretending like she was okay with all of this.

She had never realised quite how much her friends meant to her until they were suddenly not there at all. She was incredibly homesick. She even missed her parents – although they were the ones who had sent her away to avoid damaging their own reputations', sent her here to this place where no one loved her, no one at all.

Aunt Alice was frightfully distant and aloof. She barely spoke to Pansy at all and when she did it was to tell her to do something or to criticize something about her or to complain about something. Aunt Alice had always been that way though, she just seemed rather cut off from her emotions.

Her husband, Pansy's uncle, was along the same lines. Uncle Maximilian was a very tall, distinguished gentleman. He always wore very expensive, impeccably tailored suits and never seemed to have fun in any form. His face looked permanently sombre and a smile would certainly never be permitted to cross his expression let alone a laugh. He rarely spoke to Pansy, in fact in the three weeks she had been staying here he had said about ten words to her, if that.

She was lonely. So very alone. Her own parents hadn't even written to her to ask how she was. They had clearly cut her out of their lives entirely. She was no longer a concern of theirs. It was as if she no longer existed to them. She didn't care. Much. It wasn't like she needed them or anything. She would be okay.

So here she was, all alone in this strange foreign country where everyone hated her and she knew no one and she never would make any friends at this rate.

What had she done to deserve this? Was she such a bad person?

Perhaps she was. No one wanted her – not Dean or Lee or her mother or father or Aunt Alice. She was a burden on everyone.

If she had more courage, she would have ended it all by now. Or ran away. She couldn't though. She was far too scared. As much as she currently disliked her life, it had to be better than any alternative. She'd rather live this life than have no life at all.

She didn't even know what she could do to make it somewhat bearable. She wasn't used to thinking for herself, her whole life someone else, someone older and more important, had made every little decision for her. It was almost easier that way. It was what she was accustomed to. She couldn't do anything for herself. She just didn't know how to.

And she was hindered by her society upbringing. She was ever so conscious of all those little society rules – like being chaperoned and never wearing brown shoes in the evenings and only wearing dress robes at magical ceremonies. She didn't know how to even begin defying them. She couldn't break them.

She would have loved to have just turned up at a party or a ball and given it her best shot to try and fit in and make some friends but she couldn't. Firstly, good, decent girls did not go out without a chaperone. Secondly, she absolutely could not turn up all by herself. Thirdly, you did not just start a conversation with someone, you had to be introduced through a mutual friend or have them directly approach you. The whole evening would just be a disaster from start to finish. It would mean breaking every single rule she knew and she didn't think she could do such a thing. She couldn't cope with it. The rules were the only thing she knew and they were familiar and comforting over here were everything else was so very different.

No, she would just stay here and fade away.

She had been surprised to learn, however, that the French 'rules' were quite different. They just weren't the same at all. They were less strict. French girls were much wilder than she and her friends had ever been. They seemed to have so much more fun. They did whatever they wanted to and no matter how reckless or awful or image wrecking it was, no one even so much as batted an eyelid.

They turned up fashionably late to all these parties and stuck together in one corner, talking to boys (but never ever dancing with one) and chain smoking so that they were permanently engulfed in a huge cloud of smoke. They talked very loudly and were constantly emitting loud shrieks of laughter which Pansy had always considered terribly bad manners. They wore incredibly short floaty dresses, much shorter than Pansy's mother would ever allow her to wear, in lace and chiffon and silk. They were in light colours as well – dove grey or pale pink or an antique cream. They wore long strings of pearls but with an air of boredom as if wearing thousands of pounds worth of heirloom jewellery did not mean anything at all. They would all leave, en masse, at about midnight and just disappear. They never seemed to talk to the host or hostess or tell anyone they were leaving, they just went. She had asked her Aunt Alice who had told her that they usually went out to a downtown club.

Pansy didn't know much about downtown clubs but she had pieced together a picture from tiny titbits she had gleaned from other people's conversations. They were frequented by the sorts of boys that no one could ever approve of – scruffy artists, unreliable musicians, arty types with no sense of responsibility and a thing for flings with high society girls. They danced into the small hours to jazz music, drinking too much, smoking continuously and generally behaving in a louche fashion.

Pansy thought it sounded fantastic. She wished she could be like those French girls – alluring and long legged and laid back. They flirted and giggled and had fun. She wished she could be like them. Perhaps if she could let go of her pointless rules and just relax then they would let her in and turn her into one of them. They looked like they had fun. It had been a while since she had considered her life fun. A long while. She so desperately would like to be part of their group.

She wasn't. Whilst they laughed and smoked and ran off to meet rocker types, she was stuck with the dowager types and married women, pretending to be interested in their dull conversation before leaving with Aunt Alice at about ten.

What had she done to deserve this?

Alone in a foreign country surrounded by people she envied or disliked, Pansy had never been more unhappy in all her life.


	121. Oliver and Alicia 9

**A/N: For nikkiw73, Lucy Whitters, Whisperheart, crazy's wat i aim 4 and pistachio53.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Oliver x Alicia

"Get out!" She screamed angrily. Her face was very red and her little hands were clenched up into fists. Her eyes were filled with a furious rage.

"No." He told her in a fairly controlled tone. He was not going to leave his own house in the middle of the night just because she was incredibly pregnant and very hormonal with it. To be on the safe side, however, he took a small step backwards. He was not entirely sure where her wand was and with Alicia it was best to always be prepared.

Pregnancy had only exacerbated her angry tendencies. They had argued more in these last nine months than he had thought was physically possible. She was not particularly enjoying pregnancy either – she had every negative side effect going – which made her irritable which in turn made it far easier for him to accidentally irritate her. And it was accidental as well.

Their relationship had changed with her impending pregnancy as well. It was weird because she was still the same Alicia but he no longer deliberately wound her up. And he didn't like yelling at her either. She was pregnant for Merlin's sakes – you couldn't shout at a pregnant woman. There was something fundamentally wrong about that so he just took whatever she dished out.

She did not have the same reservations though. Their arguments had become a little one sided and she didn't like that so she tried to argue more in order to get him to retaliate.

Of course, she wasn't permanently angry and argumentative. When they'd done arguing, she was incredibly apologetic. She'd tell him she was sorry and say that she didn't mean it and that her hormones were making her act like this.

Bless her.

He liked her best when she was like that – sweet and calm. He still liked watching her mad though in some twisted way. She still was very beautiful when she was angry, particularly now that she was carrying his child.

As he watched her, her eyes narrowed and her hands crept protectively over her stomach in a subconscious movement. She did that a lot, as if she wanted to shield the baby from something or perhaps as if she didn't want it to hear what they were saying. "Just go, Oliver! I don't want you here right now, just give me some space!"

"No." He repeated again.

"Yes!" She said childishly.

"No." He repeated in an equally immature fashion. He was winding her up just a little bit with that one, he couldn't help himself.

"Why can't you just go away already?" She yelled in an exasperated tone. This was a sign. Rhetorical questions and slightly garbled language meant that she was nearing the end of her tether and was about ready to make up again.

"Because this is my home and you are my wife and I am staying."

"Not by choice." She hissed.

His eyes widened. That was a low blow. At first they had not been one another's perfect choice but now, he had thought things were different. He liked her. He really liked her. He had thought she felt the same way about him. "You don't love me?" He asked, his voice low and dangerous.

"No." She said defiantly and a tad triumphantly. "I hate you. Can't stand you."

She was probably lying. She wasn't even making eye contact which was usually a sure fire sign she wasn't telling the truth. It still hurt though, of course it did. She'd gone too far this time.

Suddenly, her eyes widened and her hands tightened by her stomach. She winced.

"What is it? What's wrong?" He asked worriedly, moving towards her in concern but stopping just short of actually touching her – her previous words were still swirling around his mind.

"I think I'm going to have our baby." She replied quietly. Her face was blank, impassive perhaps.

He ushered her quickly to the hospital, stopping only to grab the pre-packed hospital bag which had been waiting by the door for almost three weeks now. They were both silent on the way there, excluding the occasional pained noises Alicia was making. Clearly her contractions had started. He felt like he should be reassuring her but he didn't know what to say – after all, she had just said she hated him and although it might not be true, it could be completely true. She might hate him. Maybe he had gotten it wrong and their arguments were born of real hate, not of misplaced passion like he had always thought.

What would it mean for them if she really did hate him? What if she wanted to move out? After all, she wouldn't want to live with him much longer if she really did hate him. And obviously she would take their child with her. Maybe they would only see each other when they really had to.

That would be hard. He really did love her. But he thought he could just about cope with it, if he really had to. If she didn't want to be with him any longer then he wouldn't force her to stay with him. He could step back if he had to. He just had to love her enough to let her go. Could he do that? He thought he could, if he really did have to.

When they got to the hospital, he went straight to reception and waited with her silently until a Healer arrived. The Healer took them into their own private room and he waited outside whilst Alicia changed into a hospital gown and lay back in the bed. By now she seemed to be in a lot pain, her screams could be heard from miles away. He sat by her side, waiting with her in silent support.

"You're labour is advancing very fast." The Healer said in worried tones to the pair of them. Oliver was seated by Alicia's bedside.

"What does that mean?" Alicia puffed through another contraction. Her face was twisted in pain and her cheeks were flushed.

"Ordinarily it would just mean a very quick delivery but your baby is also breech, this must be quite a new development as it hasn't been picked up in any of your scans." The Healer flicked through Alicia's medical notes again, searching for the information that wasn't there.

"Breech?" Oliver inquired. He was unfamiliar with the word.

"Upside down. The baby is trying to come into this world feet first." The Healer replied. "It's very dangerous for the baby to be delivered like that. I think you're too advanced for me to try and turn the baby and so I think we're going to have to do an emergency Caesarean."

Oliver's eyes widened. A Caesarean? He didn't know much about them but he knew they were usually a last resort. "Is everything going to be okay?" He demanded. He couldn't lose them – Alicia and the baby. He couldn't. Not after the way they had left things.

"It should be fine." The Healer reassured the pair of them. There was a definite hint of concern in her eyes though.

Everything moved in a blur of activity after that. Alicia was rushed away to surgery. He just about managed to squeeze her hand and press his lips to her forehead for a split second before she went under. He wasn't allowed to actually be in the theatre. He had to wait in this little waiting room which stunk of despair and panic.

He paced frantically, unable to sit down, and worried. What if something went wrong? He couldn't lose either of them.

_Oh Merlin, please, please let them both be okay. I can't live without them. Just let them live. Please._

Their last few words to each other kept echoing uncomfortably in his head. Why had he said those things to her? Why had she said those things to him? What if he lost her and the last thing they had said to one another was of hatred? He couldn't lose her. Not like this. She'd make it. He had to believe that she would be okay. The Healers were experienced in things like this. They would ensure it all ran smoothly and Alicia and their child would be fine.

None of this, however, really helped to soothe his frayed nerves. A nasty little voice in the back of his mind continued to maliciously remember Alicia's last words to him, how they had left things. If she made it through, if she was safe and healthy, then he would never ever argue with her again. Never. She meant far too much to him to drive her mad anymore. He was in love with her and people in love just didn't do that to each other. They had to try and have a conventional relationship, it would mean giving up some of their former passion, but in the long run it would be a good thing. They would need to relax a little, give each other a little space but they could probably do all of that and still remain Oliver and Alicia. They could do that. They were perfectly capable of functioning like a normal couple. He needed her in his life and to do so it was probably time to stop driving each other up the walls the whole time. After all, both of them knew that they could never have maintained such a high level of fury and hatred and passion and love forever. Eventually, they would have to mellow out and he swore to himself that today was the day. He could change. They could change.

He twitched and fidgeted and paced for what seemed like forever, although in reality was only about fifteen minutes. How long could this thing take?

Finally, when he thought he could bear the tension no longer, the Healer entered. She was smiling and he prayed fervently that this meant good news. He leapt to his feet and practically accosted the poor woman.

"Please, are they okay?" His words tumbled from him, slightly jumbled in his haste to get them out.

The Healer nodded sagely. "Both your wife and your child are fine, she's asking for you." She took him out of the horrible little waiting room and along the corridor to a door. "Go on." She said. "Go and meet your child."

She left him standing there. He stood there for a good minute or two, unable to just open the door and walk in. What if she didn't want him there? She had said she hated him. But then...the Healer had said she had been asking for him. He should go in at least and he did want to meet his new baby. In fact, he was desperate to see his son or daughter.

He took a deep breath and pushed the door open gently. Alicia was lying in bed, eyes half closed. When he entered, her eyes flew open and she half smiled. The half smile died very quickly.

"Hey." He said dully.

"Hello." She replied tentatively.

There was a short silence which she broke. "Come and meet your son."

He grinned at that and walked across to her. The other side of her bed was a plastic crib lined with a blue blanket in which his son lay.

"He's...wow." He was awestruck. He'd only just lay eyes on this tiny little baby and already he loved him to bits. He was perfect.

"Yeah." Alicia agreed quietly. "Did...d'you want to hold him?"

Oliver nodded; Alicia expertly scooped him out of the cot and handed him carefully to Oliver. Oliver had never held anything so tiny and delicate and fragile in his life. He looked down at his son, just in time to see his baby open his eyes and stare back up at him. Subconsciously, he leaned in towards Alicia.

"So...d'you think we got the name right?" He asked tentatively. They had discussed names before and had eventually agreed on this one name. Now, looking at his son he thought they had made the perfect decision and he could only hope that Alicia felt the same.

"Yes." She said in a subdued tone, a little smile creeping onto her face despite herself. "I think it's perfect."

Oliver leaned down and kissed his baby's forehead tenderly. "Freddie Lewis Wood. It's just right."

He chanced a glance at Alicia. She looked very tired – half asleep and pale – but happy as well. In fact, she looked absolutely shattered. She clearly needed rest and seemed to be having trouble keeping her eyes open.

"I'msorry." She blurted out, looking away to hide her embarrassment.

He paused. "It's...it's okay."

"No, it isn't." She said firmly. "I really messed up. I got so angry and I was stupid and I was wrong because I don't hate you at all. And I was so so worried I'd never get a chance to tell you that...I love you. I really do. And you're my first choice, I'd never want to be with anyone else. Not ever. I love you."

He beamed back at her and sat on the edge of her bed, uniting them as a family. "I love you too, Alicia. I'm sorry as well. I'm really sorry and I'm going to try to stop arguing now. We can do that-"

She cut him off, smirking knowingly. "No. No we can't, Oliver. We drive each other absolutely stark raving mad, usually on purpose. We're obsessed with having control even though neither of us can control ourselves at all. Truth is, you make me mad and I make you mad and that's just how we are. We're two highly argumentative, stubborn, stupid, passionate, very in love people stuck together forever. And I wouldn't have it any other way."

**A/N: I guess you might have seen this coming – sorry, this is the final Oliver and Alicia chapter but of course they will be in the epilogue. I hope you've enjoyed reading about them. At first, I was never sure of this couple but they've suddenly worked their way into my favourites. **

**We're definitely on the home stretch now so please do not forget to read, review and request. Thank you.**


	122. Ron and Padma 8

**A/N: For Rueflowersmall and delicate, Lucy Whitters and Bri P.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Ron x Padma

People always talked about maternal love in such gushing, over the top terms. They said it was all encompassing, all consuming, never ending, that it was deeper and stronger than any other love inb the whole world. They spoke reverently about the mother child bond and how it was stronger than any other. They told of a sudden, unexpected, huge rush of love when they saw their child for the first time.

She'd never been convinced.

She realised that of course a mother would love her child but she didn't think there was any kind of love which could never be broken. Every relationship could be damaged beyond repair if enough awful things happened. Even this supposedly sacred relationship between a mother and her child could deteriorate in the right (or perhaps wrong) circumstances. And anyway, no one was physically capable of having that much love for another person. It was an exaggerated idea which no one wanted to demystify by admitting the truth for fear of being criticized for not loving their child enough.

She'd been proven wrong.

She had never loved anyone as much as she loved Jack. She hadn't even known she was capable of loving someone as much as she loved him. He was her child and she knew that she would never ever stop loving him, no matter what he did. Nothing he did would be so terrible that she would cease to love him. Nothing. He was perfect. From the very second she lay eyes on him, she knew that she loved him and that she would do anything in the world for him. She'd die for him in an instant; she wouldn't even stop to think about it. Hell, even scarier, she'd kill for him. It was her job to protect him and she was prepared to spend her whole life doing just that.

He was entirely dependent on her at the moment. She hadn't realised quite how much went into looking after a new baby. He couldn't do anything at all for himself. He didn't understand 'just five more minutes' or 'please stop crying'. He was just a baby.

It was her job to raise him. It was her job to ensure that he turned out into a decent person, a fully functioning adult. It was her job to teach him everything he needed to know about the real world so that when she was no longer able to protect him, he would be equipped to take care of himself.

Little Jack was a Weasley through and through. He was just three months old and he was already the spitting image of his father. He was pale skinned with a sprinkle of freckles already coating his little nose and threatening to spill over onto his cheeks. He even had a little shock of vivid red hair. He had brown eyes though – almost exact replicas of her own. She hadn't expected that the combination of her and Ron would turn out so spectacularly. He was perfect.

She got up silently. Ron, lying beside her, was deep in slumber. She crept down the hallway and into Jack's bedroom. She didn't bother to turn any lights on; the moon was bright outside giving off just enough light that she could see where she was going. Jack's room was next door to theirs. There hadn't been enough room to put his crib in their own bedroom.

Their house was tiny. They hadn't exactly had a lot of money to spare. They'd just about scraped together enough to buy this little place and to kit it out with just enough furniture that it didn't feel completely empty. They'd bought five mammoth tins of white paint and spent a memorable weekend painting every wall in the house. On top of that they'd had to buy all the baby stuff and that had been pretty expensive. Despite having a billion and one relatives, Ron's family hadn't been able to provide many hand-me-downs. All of his other brothers and sisters needed things as well and they'd been too late to lay claim to much. They'd had to buy everything pretty much from scratch. Hopefully, though, they wouldn't need to buy much for their second child.

Jack's room was basically a glorified cupboard. But then, he wasn't particularly big, it wasn't like he needed a lot of room. His crib was in the far corner, the small window to its left. Opposite the crib was a rocking chair, donated to them by Padma's mother. It was desperately uncomfortable but oddly soothing to sit in and rock gently.

She sat down carefully, trying not to make any noise whilst adjusting the worn cushion in an attempt to get comfortable. She sat in silence. Oddly, she wasn't tired herself. Despite the late hour and the utter lack of sleep she'd been experiencing lately, she felt quite alert. And for once, Jack was fast asleep and showing no signs of stirring. The only noise in the whole house was the sound of their joint breathing.

She'd always liked silence. Parvati had always preferred noise. She never liked the quiet – she'd always put music on in the background or talk incessantly or have the television on, anything to fill the silence, it unnerved her, made her panic. Padma liked silence. She liked the peace, the serenity of no noise. It made her feel calmer, more tranquil, soothed almost.

It felt, at that moment, as if time itself had frozen, leaving the two of them – her beloved son and herself - suspended like this forever. Everything was still and quiet. Nothing moved.

As she watched her son, she felt a sense of calm wash gently through her.

As a mother, she suddenly had another priority. At all times, a small part of her mind was focused on her son and how he was and whether he was okay. She found it hard to subdue this part enough to fully relax. She even slept lighter these days, unable to switch off enough to fall into a real deep sleep even though she was permanently tired. She just wanted to protect Jack all of the time and she couldn't do that when she was asleep, could she?

Protect him from everything – from disappointment and failure and hatred and everything that is bad and evil and cruel about these world. Protect him from 'friends' who'd let him down and girls who'd break his heart and people who'd never quite live up to his expectations. Protect him from hurt and damage and pain and grief and agony.

The outside world was a frightening place. All number of awful and horrific things lurked out there. How could she send her son out into that? It was her job to protect Jack. She had to make sure that her son would be able to cope with the big bad world.

And that was what she was going to try to do.

She'd have help though, someone else would be alongside her the whole time – protecting, loving, teaching. She wouldn't have to do it all alone. She'd have Ron.

Ron had taken to fatherhood far better than she had expected. She'd always known he was worried about being a dad and whether he would be a good father. (She'd always known he would be.) However, she had privately harboured concerns about how he would cope. He wasn't particularly good with accepting responsibility and she knew he had always felt inadequate. It hadn't been like that at all.

He'd been smitten from the very moment she saw Jack. She loved watching them together. Ron was unbelievably careful with his tiny son and seeing them interact only made her fall in love with him all over again. He was a really good dad, she'd always known he would be but it was nice to have confirmation.

Having Jack had brought them closer together. She'd been worried that they wouldn't feel the same when they were both tired from lack of sleep and when they suddenly had to be always thinking about the baby and when they were so busy they barely had time to speak to each other let alone have an actual conversation. She'd been worried that concerns over money and the house and space would boil over and turn into arguments, probably fuelled by stress and fatigue, dragging them apart. She'd been worried that she wouldn't be able to be as in love with Ron as she had been when she had to love her son as well, she'd wondered if she'd have enough love for the both of them.

So far, they were managing fine. They'd both matured since Jack's birth and suddenly being together all the time and sharing every little detail of their lives together wasn't quite so important, they still did that but they both accepted that Jack needed to come first. They hadn't argued once, they disagreed over things but that was only normal, and admittedly they were both worrying about their meagre finances but they had each other and they'd work things out. And, she'd definitely managed to find enough love for the both of them. She hadn't even known she possessed so much love but she loved the both of them more than any other people in the world and nothing would ever change that.

Her sixth sense must have suddenly kicked in because she felt as if she were being watched. Instinctively turning, she saw Ron standing in the doorway. He half smiled at her. He looked tired, as if he had just woken, and his hair was sleep tousled.

"Hey." She whispered softly.

"'Lo. What're you doing?"

"Just checking on him." She glanced at Jack again.

He walked towards her, leaning one hand on the back of the rocking chair. He peered at his son anxiously. "He looks fine, sweetheart. He's okay."

"I know." She said reassuringly. "I just wanted to make sure."

"I was worried when I woke up and you weren't there." He admitted quietly, dropping his gaze. The war was over now but people still worried. She knew that Ron had seen awful things, things that no seventeen year old should ever have to see, and that he had nightmares about it even now. She could only imagine how panicked he had been to wake, probably from some awful Death Eater infested dream, to find his wife missing.

She slipped her hand up to meet his, lacing her fingers through his. "Sorry I worried you." She paused. Now seemed to be the perfect time. "I have something to tell you."

A little crease appeared in between his eyebrows.

"I'm pregnant." She whispered up at him.

He froze. Then he blinked once very deliberately. His mouth turned up into a smile. "That's...that's fantastic." He said very quietly, conscious that Jack was still fast asleep.

"We might get our little Rose."

"Hope so – we don't have another boy's name. A second boy would just have to be Jack as well."

Padma smiled. "That could get confusing."

"It could." He agreed. "How...how long've you known you were...expecting?"

"Not long." She replied in a low voice. "I'd suspected for a few days but I only took the test this morning. I was going to tell you earlier but Jack was demanding to be fed."

She'd had her suspicions for about a week before she'd done anything. She'd been too scared to take the test. She was scared she would be pregnant – how would they ever cope? They were both still teenagers, they had barely enough space in their house for the three of them, they had hardly any money and no source of income at the present time, how could they ever have two children? She was scared she wouldn't be pregnant. She couldn't even begin to imagine how awful it would be to find out that you weren't pregnant. She already loved her baby. Her Rose. She'd been so worried that Rose didn't even exist, not yet.

He smiled. "I hope they'll be friends. They're so close in age; they'll almost be like twins."

"A year in between them, give or take." She said. "And hopefully, that'll be a good thing."

"I have no idea how we're going to cope." Ron said bluntly.

"Me neither."

"We don't even have another room for her. Or him."

"Nope." She said lightly.

"I don't have a job yet." A note of despair crept into Ron's voice.

"Neither do I." Padma grinned.

"And we've got a third child to come as well."

"Yeah."

"Wow." Ron said in disbelief.

"I know."

"We'll be okay though, right?" He asked worriedly. He wouldn't quite meet her eyes, as he so often did when he was embarrassed about speaking his thoughts out loud.

"Of course we will." She said in a tone which implied it should be obvious.

He took her hands, pulling her out of the chair and into his arms and kissed her full on the mouth.

"I love you." He said tenderly.

"I love you too."

**A/N: This is the very last chapter of Ron and Padma.**

**As requested by someone, I forget who, these are the couples you can still request:  
- Fred and Angelina  
- Neville and Hannah  
- Lee and Pansy.**

**Yes that's right, just three more chapters before the epilogue! I'd like to thank everyone who had reviewed so far, special thanks go to those who have stuck with this from the very beginning. **


	123. Fred and Angelina 9

**A/N: For Rueflowersmall and delicate, Whisperheart, HPTICP Fan, Nymphadora Potter, HufflepuffWitch, pistachio53, Frenzied Warrior and Amri Ishvique**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Fred x Angelina

You've been in this situation so very many times before. Pretty much every single month in fact. You do it every single time. Sometimes you're about ninety nine percent sure that you're not but, you reason, it never hurts to check. You're wrong. It still hurts every single time. You'd think that you would get used to it, after a time, but you never do. You never will.

It still feels exactly the same every single time you see that little line. Disappointed and hurt and like a failure. The line means you have failed and that it hasn't happened yet and perhaps that it never will. The line means no and you hate the line. Two lines is what it's all about. Two adjacent lines forming a little cross. You practically dream about those little crosses.

One little cross and you'd be happy. That's all you would need. Just one tiny little cross and you'd never be unhappy again. Never.

Most witches prefer magical tests. They are supposed to be more reliable and they're quicker and they can tell a few days before Muggle ones can. You prefer to go old school, do it the Muggle way. You sometimes do it the magical way just to check, even though the Muggle tests never get it wrong. The Muggles get a lot of things right, they need more credit really. The Muggle way feels more dramatic as well. There's a dramatic build up whilst you wait those two minutes for the result to form, praying desperately that today, today it will be a cross.

And for those two minutes, whilst you are waiting for the results to form and praying that today will not be a line day, you can pretend like you've already got a cross. You can imagine how it will feel when you see that little cross. Ecstatic will probably be an understatement. You can picture Fred's face when you tell him and how he will be completely thrilled and shocked and amazed. You can imagine painting the nursery and choosing colours and new furniture. You can imagine squabbling about names and choosing out middle names. You dream about the baby itself and what it will look like and whether it's a boy or a girl. You think about how it will grow up and what sort of person it will be and the qualities your child will have (it'll only have good qualities, of course). You imagine waving goodbye to him or her as they depart on the Hogwarts Express, tears streaming down your face and Fred's arm around you. You dream them up a perfect partner and think about their wedding and how amazing it will be and how in love the happy couple will be and how you'll cry. You even consider grandchildren and what they'll be like.

For those one hundred and twenty seconds you can dream. For those one hundred and twenty seconds you can picture your child. For those one hundred and twenty seconds you have that child.

It hurts. It hurts more when it's a line. Especially when you've planned it all out. You've conjured up a mental picture of this baby, your baby, only to have it all cruelly snatched away, crossed out by that one line. You really hate the line. You've lost so very many imagined babies with those lines, too many to even count.

You sit down on the closed toilet lid. It's cold. You can feel how freezing it is through your jeans. The little stick, that oh so important little stick, is in the sink, on that little indentation where the soap is supposed to go.

You don't waste time by looking at it. Instead, you focus all your attention forwards, watching back of the bathroom door.

You dream of this baby.

This baby will be a girl, a beautiful little girl with dark hair and Weasley freckles and Fred's blue eyes. She'll be stunning, the envy of all her friends and the girl every boy loves. She'll be kind and generous and friendly. She'll be clever as well. Everyone will want to be friends with her. She'll do very well at school, Head Girl perhaps or Gryffindor Quidditch Captain, like her mother was. She'll find her perfect match at school; he might be her fellow Head Boy or the Quidditch Captain of Ravenclaw. She'll get her perfect job – teaching perhaps or playing Quidditch or something equally as good. She'll marry young and have children fairly young. Two children, probably, perhaps three. They'll be perfect as well. Her girl will have a dream life. She'll be happy and healthy and loved.

You can see her in your mind now, she looks so real you could almost reach out and touch her. Almost.

You glance at your watch. The seconds tick away slowly. Every second feels like a minute. Two minutes is a very long time, no one ever realises quite how long they really are. You hold the picture of this little girl in your mind for the last few seconds. You are convinced she will be ripped away from you any time now and you need to hold on, cherish the few moments you have left with her before she goes and is crossed out by the line.

Five...four...three...two...one.

It's time. Time to find out. Time for your little girl to disappear. You get up slowly, easing yourself to your feet. You glance at that inconspicuous little stick. Then you stare.

Your eyes widen and a bloodcurdling shriek rips from your throat before you can help it.

OhsweetMerlin!

Fred flies upstairs in a frenzied panic, wand drawn, clearly expecting the worst, perhaps a mass murder with a knife to your throat or something. His expression is frantic.

"Angie, baby? What's wrong?" He demands. He takes your hands in his, tucking his wand back into his pocket. He doesn't quite know what to do. You can practically see the cogs whirring away in his head as he goes through various scenarios trying to work out what is wrong.

"I'm pregnant!" You scream excitedly. You have waited a very long time to say those words. It feels fantastic to finally be able to say them.

"What?" His expression is one of stunned disbelief, clearly he had not imagined this little scenario. Joy is bubbling away under the surface just waiting to break free.

"I'm pregnant." You repeat again. You practically glow with satisfaction as you repeat yourself. You've waited so long to say those two little words. You could say them all day. Tears are running down your cheeks. Happy tears. You've waited so long for this moment. You want to remember this moment forever. You've never been so happy in your whole life.

This has not been an easy year for the two of you. You lost your very first baby. He or she didn't make it into this world alive. The grieving process was hard and brutal and agonising. You just about managed to drag yourself through each day. It got easier though. Fractionally. You can breathe normally now and you don't blame yourself as much. You just miss the baby you have lost. You have been trying again, trying to get pregnant, because the law states that you have to have a baby in your first two years of marriage. Nothing had happened. Nothing. You hadn't gotten pregnant. You'd had to look into getting some help. In the magical world, fertility treatment was not something you did, not something you wanted to do. And then, just when you thought that was going to be your only option, the only thing you could do, just like that you were pregnant. You hadn't been expecting it. Of course it was always a possibility – you weren't exactly not trying – but you'd been so convinced that you couldn't conceive naturally. And it had happened. You were pregnant!

Your little girl. That little girl you had just dreamed of, well she could be a reality. In nine months time, that same little girl could be in your arms.

Or it could be a little boy – the spitting image of his father in both looks and personality. Red haired, freckled and mischievous.

You watch Fred anxiously, waiting for his response.

His mouth turns up into a huge grin which reaches all the way to his eyes and changes his whole face. You haven't seen him smile, really smile, like this in a very long time and you don't realise until now just how much you have missed it.

He steps forward and sweeps you into his arms, holding you close, spinning you round in circles, picking you up off of your feet.

"How did this even happen?" He murmurs into your ear.

"I have no idea." You reply breathlessly. He's crying as well, tears running down his cheeks. He seems almost embarrassed though, hiding his face in your shoulder so you can't see. You don't care. His tears are proof that he wants this just as much as you do, that he is equally as thrilled, that he loves this baby as much as you already do.

"I didn't even think we could. I thought...well, I thought it wasn't going to happen for us."

"Me neither. But...well, I've done the test and I am and...I just...I just cannot believe it." You're having difficulty articulating words your emotions are so strong. You are crying and yet you have the biggest smile on your face.

You have never ever been so happy in your whole life. Ever. The months of pain and heartbreak and grief are somehow all worth it for this one little moment of pure, unadulterated joy.

"I cannot believe this." Fred repeats every few moments. It still hasn't sunk in for either of you yet.

"Me neither." You reply every single time, blindly answering him. You still cannot believe it.

Luckily, you have nine months to get used to the fact. Nine months before your perfect little girl or boy is in your arms. You love him or her already. You have just nine months before your life is made complete. You have so much to do – you have to pick names and the nursery needs redecorating and you have a lot of baby stuff still to buy. You cannot wait.

You'll be a little family. A real family. You've waited for so long, wanted this so badly, and now it's happening. You're having a baby, you're having Fred's baby. You can't wait.

**A/N: Finally a happy ending for Fred and Angelina. Unfortunately, this is their very last chapter. Look out for them in the epilogue!**


	124. Lee and Pansy 8

**A/N: I'M SORRY! I know it's been a while but I do have some excuses (and I'll grovel?)  
- Firstly, I am now sixteen! I got really caught up with birthday celebrations. On the plus side, I can now drink, smoke, buy a lottery ticket, get married (with parental permission) and have a baby! (I'm not going to. I just could. If I wanted to.)  
- Secondly, I've been published! It's only in a poetry anthology for young writers but nevertheless, I have been published and I've been so excited about that I got all inspired to write my own material for a little while.  
- Thirdly, both the computers in my household broke. At the same time, courtesy of my father and brother.  
- Fourthly, not only did my laptop break, it then crashed and decided to wipe everything I already had. I had pretty much written out the last four chapters so I'm going to have to rewrite everything but I've got a bit of time now so I should be finishing this very soon.**

**This is for crazywriter101, pistachio53, jeweltheif500, karlii, Spring butterfly and everyone else. (Sorry if I've missed you – my records of who had requested were wiped as well.) **

**Disclaimer: 123 chapters in and I still don't own Harry Potter.**

Lee x Pansy

She had never felt like this before. It was new and exciting and a little bit frightening.

She was in love. Real, true love.

He was her world, her life even. He was the only one for her, she knew that much already.

She could still remember the very first time she met him like it was only yesterday.

She had been at another boring social function with Aunt Alice. Her aunt insisted on dragging her to these things even though she quite clearly loathed them. This one was afternoon tea at one of Aunt Alice's best friend's houses. Her house was much the same as everyone else's – shabby chic with an element of faded grandeur, very French, quite lovely if you liked that sort of thing. Pansy preferred something a bit more ostentatious tell truth, a few more chandeliers and some priceless artwork and a gigantic golden ballroom, that sort of thing.

They were congregated in the drawing room helping themselves to tiny sweet macaroons and cups of English tea. It was typical afternoon tea fare – sweet and appetising but not substantial enough for actual sustenance. There were a lot of people there, all elderly women mostly widowed or with similarly ancient husbands. Pansy was sitting slightly by herself pretending she didn't feel stupid and bored and out of place whilst feeling precisely all of that. She found these things dull. There was never anyone her own age there and mostly she was just ignored because she hadn't got a particularly good grip on the language yet.

She looked up at the split second that he entered.

Gabriel.

Her very own angel, they liked to say sometimes. She liked to believe that his name meant that some higher being had willed for the two of them to be together, had sent him just for her. He thought it was all nonsense but humoured her anyway.

He was dark haired with strong features and dark eyes. He was wearing a dark suit with a dark green tie and shiny shoes. He radiated money and power (both of which he had in large quantities). He wasn't conventionally attractive but there was something about him that drew her in. She watched from the corner of her eye, whilst pretending to be thoroughly engrossed in her tea, as he greeted his great aunt (who owned the house) and her Aunt Alice and everyone else in the room in a flurry of hand kissing and loud greetings and charm.

Finally, finally, he made his way over to her.

Before she could speak, he proffered her hand to her. "I just had to come over to see who the prettiest girl in ze room was." He spoke almost perfect English with a very slight accent.

Surprisingly herself by not even pausing to consider her actions, she rather boldly placed her hand into his. "I bet you say that to all the girls. But my name is Pansy."

"I am Gabriel." He said, not taking her eyes off of her.

He continued speaking to her, easy effortless conversation which interested her and made her laugh, and wound up sitting beside her, pouring her tea as they talked continuously until it was time for Pansy to leave. She went home and went straight to her room. She flopped down onto her bed and knew that she had found the one.

This was the man she loved. This was the only man she would ever love. This was the man she would marry.

She met him many times after that. Everywhere she went, he would be. She never knew how he managed it. Sometimes he would already be there, turned expectantly towards the doorway with a ready smile and a glass in his hand already prepared to hand to her. Other times he would turn up a little later, sweeping into the room and making his way fairly quickly over to her.

They talked a lot. He treated her like a real person. She'd never been with anyone who cared about what she had to say before, who wanted to know her opinion on things and who quite regularly disagreed with her opinions. He challenged her, he made her think, he made her more aware of her surroundings. He was the kind of person who was always flitting about. In fact, she'd never seen him talk to one person for longer than about five minutes. Apart from her. Of course. She was his exception.

Sometimes, if everyone else in the room was sufficiently distracted, they would wander off together and explore the big, old houses the functions were being held in. They were always amazing places with lots to look at and everything was simply better with him there. He made her life better, brighter, sparkier.

Gabriel was the sort of person that knew everyone and everything. He was knowledgeable on every subject and he knew little things as well – like where the best places to eat in the city were. She had the most amazing times with him.

She'd never felt this way and she'd do anything in the world to feel like this for the rest of her life. She'd never really been loved before and it was a whole new experience for her. Loving him made her life better. He made her want to be a better person, for him, she wanted to be the sort of person who could stand by his side and feel like she had every right to be there. She was doing her best to become that person. And, in opening her heart to him, she had found that it was much easier to open her heart to others. She had suddenly become very close with Aunt Alice. The elderly lady spoke to her like she would a daughter, telling her all about her youth and buying her new dresses to impress her new beau. She'd even written to her parents (whom she had previously sworn never to talk to again) to tell them about Gabriel and to thank them for sending her to France.

Gabriel was her life. Her world. Her one and only. She could no longer imagine life without him. She couldn't remember what her life had been like before he entered it. He was everything.

He wasn't always perfect – she often tended to forget his flaws when she was with him but they were there. He was abrupt sometimes to the point of rudeness. He hated social events and would do anything to get out of them. He was often very serious and his sense of humour was a little lapsed which made him seem rather overbearing and a little aloof.

She didn't care about any of that. He wasn't perfect, well neither was she, she loved him just the same.

She was just waiting now. It was only a matter of time, everyone said so. He was going to ask her to marry him. She was sure of it. He had already spoken about it to Aunt Alice in an abstract sort of way but it was good enough for her. She could not wait to be his wife.

Mrs Raphael Simonin. Pansy Simonin. It sounded good. It sounded really good.

She had decided to make all the preparations beforehand so that when the time came for him to ask she could say yes instantly. (Not that she wouldn't anyway, it was just nice to be prepared.)

She had written to her parents and spoken about it with Aunt Alice and then she had written a letter to the Ministry. She didn't think she needed their permission but there was that nuisance of a Marriage Law to take into account and she was not taking any chances. At least this way they wouldn't try and marry her off to the outlaw Lee Jordan. When he was eventually found and undoubtedly carted off to Azkaban, she would be a married woman living in France with her new husband and possibly a baby.

"Pansy!" Aunt Alice called from somewhere downstairs. "Owl for you."

She dashed downstairs, skidding to a halt at the hallway where Aunt Alice was holding a letter out towards her and very engrossed in reading her own mail. Pansy took it wordlessly. It bore the Ministry seal. Finally. Finally, she would be able to marry him, her Raphael.

'_Dear Miss Parkinson,_

_We thank you for your letter informing us of the pending marriage between you and a Mr Raphael Simonin. Unfortunately, you are already betrothed to a Mr Lee Jordan and upon his arrest the two of you will be married as is decreed by law. Any marriage that takes place between you and Mr Simonin will regarded as an illegal union and could result in arrest, imprisonment and annulment of the marriage. We express our deepest regrets and wish to assure you that our finest Aurors are searching for Mr Jordan. _

_Hoping you are well.  
Percy Weasley, Secretary to the Minister of Magic'_

It was as if the bottom had fallen out of her world. All of her dreams and hopes and plans for her future had been dashed. She couldn't marry Raphael, the love of her life.

What would happen now? He would never stay with her if he could not legally make her his wife. They couldn't be together without marrying, society would never allow it. He had to marry her, she had to be his wife. Without a ring on her finger, their relationship would be contraband, forbidden. They couldn't go on like this forever. They could never progress if she wasn't his wife, it simply wouldn't be allowed.

He would leave her. Perhaps not initially (or, she thought, he might just leave her immediately - it might be less painful that way) but one day he would end it and marry some beautiful girl who could live with him and give him children.

She stumbled back up to her room blindly, trying not to cry. When she was barricaded behind her door in the relative safety of her bedroom, she allowed herself to breakdown and cry. She did not cry often or easily. She was more the suffer-in-silence type but this was really too much. Tears seemed like the only way forward.

He was going to leave her. How could she live without him? She didn't even think she could. Sweet Merlin, she knew she couldn't live without him.

"Pansy, mon Cheri." As if by magic, her love appeared in her doorway. She blinked in surprise. "Your Aunt Alice allowed me to come and visit you, she said you seemed upset and now I see that you are more than upset." He took her into his arms and held her close. She instantly felt just a little better. He very gently wiped her tears away with his thumb.

"Now, tell me what is wrong." He asked carefully.

She held the letter out to him wordlessly. He let go of her to take it and read through it quickly.

She waited in silence. This was it. He wouldn't want her any longer. He would leave her.

"You wrote to your government to check we could marry?"

She nodded, not meeting his eyes. She had been too presumptuous; clearly he had not wanted to marry her. Ever.

She risked a quick glance to meet his eyes, unable to hold back any longer. He was grinning.

"You wanted us to be together, to be married as husband and wife. I am most pleased." Strong emotions tended to affect the quality of Raphael's English.

"Of course I did." She said. Wasn't it obvious? "But we can't get married." She finished in a downcast, despairing tone.

He nodded. "No, we cannot. But that does not matter. We do not need to be married to prove that we are in love, one day perhaps your Ministry will realise ze mistake it has made in not allowing us to marry but until then...well, we shall live in sin together quite happily."

She threw her arms around him and kissed him. "I love you." She declared breathlessly.

"Je t'aime aussi." He replied happily.

It didn't matter that they couldn't get married. It didn't matter that everyone would look down on them for not being married. It didn't matter what everyone would say about them. They were in love and they would not let something like this tear them apart. After all, he was her angel and he was destined to stay with her forever.

**A/N: This is the very last Lee and Pansy chapter. I have found myself, shockingly, warming to Pansy and I feel she deserves a happy ending. I know that not everyone will agree with me but I just wanted her to have a little bit of happiness. **

**I know there was no mention of Lee but I have a few surprises for you regarding him in the epilogue (any guesses? Stick them in a review!) There is only one more couple left – Neville and Hannah – feel free to keep requesting them! **


	125. Neville and Hannah 9

**A/N: For missb14, lovenotwar, Afrenchgirl, Nladdict, Belles27, pistachio53, Spring butterfly and everyone else who requested these two.**

**Disclaimer: I still do not own Harry Potter.**

Neville x Hannah

He had never been so frantic in his life.

He'd rushed Hannah here with great speed, moving faster quicker than he had thought was even possible, bursting through the hospital doors like something from a bad film yelling that they needed help. And they did need help. The baby was coming too soon. A month too soon. That could have terrible implications. It could all be fine and their baby could be well and healthy - but it could go all so very wrong.

The Healers had kicked into action and took Hannah from his arms. They levitated her away almost instantly. That meant it was bad. He was sure of it. He hadn't been allowed to follow. He'd stood there uselessly not sure what to do, not sure if he was even able to do anything, what could he do? How could he save them? His thoughts were spinning and his mind kept conjuring up awful scenarios and he could hardly think straight.

He sank to his knees and fell backwards so he was sitting against the wall. He buried his head in his hands and tried to focus on breathing. In. Out. In. Out.

What would happen if he lost them? He wouldn't be able to do it. He could not lose them. Either of them. Oh dear Merlin, save them...

He could feel people watching him, their curious gazes felt as if they were burning his skin. People were wondering what had happened. What could have happened that was so awful that this recognised war hero would be sitting here like this.

The tap of feet made him lift his head expectantly. A Healer stood before him clad in neat blue robes. Something about the regularity and order of it all made him feel a little better and cleared his thoughts just fractionally. "Mr Longbottom?"

"Yes." He scrambled messily to his feet, using the wall for support. He was desperate for news, preferably of the good variety.

"Your wife has gone into early labour and it's too advanced to halt. We are going to have to perform an emergency Caesarean and then the baby will be placed into intensive care. We aren't sure how well they will get through this."

"Will they make it?" He demanded desperately. Oh Merlin, please.

"We'll do everything we can." She said avoiding both his eyes and the question.

He was shown to a little waiting room which reeked of hopelessness and despair where he paced frantically up and down, up and down. He wished he were able to see what was happening or at least to have some kind of update. He had absolutely no idea what was going on. Anything could be happening. He could be losing his wife and baby right now and he wouldn't even know. Would he feel it? If one of them died, surely he would feel something inside. People always claimed that they knew when a loved one was passing, even if they were thousands of miles away, surely he would know.

_Oh Merlin, please save them._

He tried to remember what the last thing he had said to Hannah was. He couldn't even remember but it couldn't have been good. They weren't nice to each other anymore. He regretted that immensely. He should have stepped up a long time ago now. He should have been there for Hannah. She had been very stressed for far too long and it was mostly his fault, she needed help and he hadn't been there to provide it and then the baby had came too early...and Merlin, they might not make it through this.

He tried to rationalise. Imagine the worst case scenario.

If Hannah didn't make it, he'd have to raise the baby alone. He would have no idea what he was doing. He'd spend his life resenting his own child for reminding him of the wife he had lost, he would never get another chance to say goodbye to Hannah, to tell her he was so sorry for what he had put her through and that he loved her so very much. If he lost her, he'd make it. Just.

If the baby didn't survive, him and Hannah would probably be torn apart by the grief. It would be too much for both of them and probably would signal the end of their marriage. He'd lose not only his baby but the love of his life as well. They would still be married but it would be a very different union. They would make it though, they would survive. Just.

If neither made it...well, neither would he.

He paced endlessly and checked his watch religiously every five seconds. Time was moving more slowly than he thought possible. How could only one hour have gone by? It felt like a year had passed.

After what seemed like forever, the Healer entered. Her face was blank, impassive and impossible to read.

She reached him and smiled. It was then that he knew things were okay. "Hannah is fine." She began and Neville's heart leapt. She was okay! "She's very tired and needs a lot of rest but she will be okay in time...and you have a son. He's well, fairly healthy considering. He's in intensive care for now but he should be out within a few days. He's a little small but he'll get bigger. You can visit him later...your wife, she's asking for you."

They'd made it. They were okay. Oh Merlin thank you thank you thank you. He was escatic, delirious with sheer happiness. Things were going to be okay.

He followed the Healer impatiently to Hannah's little room. He knows this hospital like the back of his hand – he could have made it here alone. He didn't overtake the Healer, even though he really wanted to, because he didn't want to be rude. This woman, and a whole host of others, had saved his wife and child. He would be eternally grateful to them.

She looks very tiny in the hospital bed. He hadn't expected Hannah to look so small and fragile and pale. He wants to draw her close and just hold her. He wants to hug her and hold her and promise never to leave again. He wants to tell her that he loves her.

He doesn't.

He doesn't think he's allowed to anymore. Not now. Not with how things are.

He walks over to the bed and the Healer, obviously picking up on his silent cues, leaves to 'give them a moment'. Hannah's eyes snap open and she half smiles at him. It's very brief, so fleeting that he thinks he might have imagined it, but he's pretty sure it was a smile nonetheless. He half smiles back.

"Neville." She says weakly. She turns her head slowly so she is facing him and he takes the seat by her bedside, leaning forward in a bid to be close to her. He's come to close to losing her that he never wants to be away from her ever again.

"Han. Are you okay?" He wants to hold her hand and just about manages to restrain himself.

"Yeah. How's...how is he?" He knows who she is talking about even without her stating explicitly.

"I haven't seen him yet but the Healer said he was fine." He says soothingly.

"You should go and see him and check for me. They won't let me go. You have to see he's okay." She commands in an oddly strong tone considering her weakened state. They say that a mother's instinct can overcome all number of hurdles.

He nodded obediently. "I will."

There is a pause. Her eyes flutter close but he knows she isn't asleep. "I thought...I thought I was going to l-lose you." His voice cracks and he drops his gaze, embarrassed, worried, waiting for her reaction.

He feels a light touch just skim his arm. Her touch is achingly familiar, she hasn't reached out for him in so long and it instantly calms him, reassures him, makes him relax. Her hand reaches for his and he clasps it tightly in his.

"You won't lose me." She says reassuringly.

"Hannah, I love you." He says desperately, tears forming in the corner of his eyes. "I love you so much." He presses his lips briefly to her hand which is clasped between his. "I'm so...so sorry. I'll be better, I promise. I'm better now, I am. I'm ready to be your husband and a father and the sort of person you deserve." The words tumble over themselves in a bid to get out and they are clumsy and messy and don't quite make perfect sense but they are heartfelt and he hopes that that will be enough.

At the end of his impassioned speech, both are crying. She smiles at him softly and it is the old Hannah, his Hannah, who is looking at him. All of her harsh words and hard edges have been melted away and his Hannah is back. "I love you too. I never stopped loving you, Neville, you're the only one I'll ever love. But things have been hard lately-"

He cuts her off desperately, ready to plead for a second chance, for a chance to be her husband and a father. "I'll change. I will. Honestly. I'm trying. I'll be better."

She holds up one hand to stop him. "I know you will. You're a good man and right now I need a husband and our baby needs a father and you are gonna be both of those things." She tells him this in a severe tone but her next two words are desperate – a plea from the heart. "Promise me."

"I promise." He repeats like a child, clutching at her hands tightly, tears running down his cheeks. "I promise."

_Three weeks later -_

The sun is shining and the sky is a perfect cloudless blue and Neville Longbottom has never been happier.

He strolls down the road leading away from Hogwarts, whistling tunelessly to himself.

Hannah is waiting for him at home. His Hannah is back – the Hannah who he first fell in love with all those months ago – and they are more in love than ever. It's not perfect, of course, they both have changed sufficiently and there are little tensions every now and then. They're both sleep deprived and a little tougher than before but it's better than before. They understand each other now. A lot better than they ever did. They take it in turns to be the supportive one instead of him being her rock all the time. They know each other better and they benefit from that.

They're just perfect.

His son – Evan – is the most perfect child in the world. He's happy and healthy. His birth brought them together and now the three of them have formed a perfect little family. He'd do anything for them – for Evan and for Hannah. He wants to provide for them, to give them everything they want and to make sure they have the perfect life. Life will be good for Evan, he's sure of it. His child will have the most fantastic life – he'll be healthy and successful and happy.

And, the icing on the cake, Neville has just got himself a job. He is the newest Professor at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. From September, he will be teaching Herbology, his favourite subject and lifelong passion. He had been considering a job change for a long time. He wanted to do something worthwhile and probably with plants. This was his perfect job.

Oh yes, life is just perfect for Neville.

The sun is shining and the sky is a perfect cloudless blue and Neville Longbottom has never been happier.

**A/N: ****This is the last Neville and Hannah chapter and the very last couple chapter! I am no longer accepting any requests but feel free to speculate on anything – what will happen next, what will happen in the epilogue etc. etc. I'd love to know what you think will happen.**

**I would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who has read, reviewed and requested. Your reviews have made my life a whole lot happier and I am so glad so many of you have enjoyed this. Thank you once again.**


	126. The End

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

'_**MINISTRY ENDS MARRIAGE LAW! **_

_In an unprecedented move the Ministry of Magic last night ended the highly controversial marriage law. Newly elected Minister of Magic, Percy Weasley, made the announcement in a short statement, 'The Ministry of Magic has made the decision to end the marriage law. We believe it was a poorly advised decision to have been made and that it is time for change. All couples who were matched through this law deserve a chance to find real love and happiness. Every couple will be given the chance to separate. I would like to apologise, on behalf of the entire Ministry, for all those whose lives have been made unhappy by this law.'_

_Percy Weasley was matched to Cho Chang in the law and revealed that he will be separating amicably from his wife but will remain living together for the sake of their children – Maddie, 18, Samuel, 17, and Joel, 15. The Minister campaigned, and won his election, based on the promise of ending this law. _

_The marriage law was reintroduced eighteen years ago, shortly after the Second Wizarding War, in order to boost falling numbers of wizarding population. All unmarried wizards and witches between the ages of seventeen and thirty-five were matched and forced to marry. All couples were required to produce at least three children, the first of which had to be born in the first year of marriage. At the time the law was highly unpopular although there was a swing in public opinion, widely accredited to the attraction charms placed upon the marriage contracts. The law was only enforced for one year meaning that all those who reached the relevant ages after the initial time frame were not matched or asked to marry. This caused national outcry, particularly from those who were forced into marriage, although it was generally seen as a wise move by the Ministry._

_For years many have campaigned for an end to the law. Leader of the only known anti marriage law resistance group still active, the infamous Lee Jordan, last night came out of hiding for the first time in eighteen years having avoided Ministry capture throughout this time. He had this to say, 'I am so pleased the Ministry has seen the error of this law. Percy Weasley as well as being a former friend is a good man. I'm looking forward to being reunited with all my friends and family who I have missed so dearly and to live in the real world again!' Mr Jordan also announced his engagement to his second-in-command Penelope Clearwater._

_All couples who were matched by the law will today receive a letter giving them the opportunity to separate and receive a divorce. This process will be coordinated by the newly set up Marriage Law Offices. It is expected that around thirty-nine percent of couples will separate._

_Former Minister, Kingsley Shacklebolt, who was forced from office just thirteen months after reinstating the law had this to say from his countryside home, 'I respect the decision of Percy Weasley. He will be a good Minister to you all.'_

_Harry Potter, the Chosen One, infamous for defying the Ministry to marry his childhood sweetheart Ginevra Weasley said, 'I will, of course, be staying with my wife and family although I believe that the ending of the law is a really good thing. I'm glad the Ministry has finally seen sense.'_

_For further information regarding the ending of the law and divorces, please write to the Marriage Law Offices, Contract Termination Offices at the Ministry building._

_For more on this story see pages 3-8, 11, 16 and 20!_


	127. Epilogue

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

Epilogue

Wizards and witches across the country were throwing parties and celebrating in the streets. She wasn't old enough to remember but it was probably very similar to the day that baby Harry had survived You-Know-Who's attack.

Parvati Finnigan was not celebrating. She didn't need to.

The marriage law had ended but for her it was irrelevant. The law had matched her and Seamus admittedly. But they had been dating before then. Their love was not because of the law. It had been hurried along a little by the law but it was already there.

Her little Priya came running in. Priya had just turned fifteen and as a general rule did not run anymore, running was most definitely not cool like Merlin Mum don't you know anything? Like at all, god. Clearly something big had happened. Speaking of big – when had her little baby gotten so large? She was a teenager now, on the verge of womanhood. Parvati pulled herself out of her reminisces and smiled at her youngest daughter.

"Mum!" Priya said, sliding into the kitchen chair opposite her mother.

"Yes, love."

Priya was so much like Seamus it was unbelievable. Physically, of course, they weren't much alike at all (although Priya had Seamus' blue eyes) but when she spoke, the way she moved, her whole attitude. It was all Seamus. Her daughter bit her lip worriedly. "You and Daddy...well, you aren't...you know, separating are you?"

A third voice interrupted quite firmly. "Never."

Parvati smiled expectantly as her husband walked in, kissing the top of her head and repeating the gesture to his youngest daughter before sitting down with them.

"Your mother and I will never separate." He told Priya in an assured tone. "Will we?"

"Nope." Parvati agreed. "Your dad and I were matched by the law but we were in love well before the Ministry told us to get married. We would have been together anyway."

Priya leaned back, her fears obviously soothed. "Good because everyone keeps saying that their parents aren't gonna be together anymore and I was so worried it would happen to you two even though Darce and Caity said you two would never break up."

"And we were right."

"As always."

Her oldest daughters – Darcey and Caitlyn – walked in wearing identically smug grins. They were true twins. They even finished each other's sentences. They had the sort of twin relationship Parvati wished she had had with her own twin. She was a lot closer to Padma now though. They spoke every single day. They shared more of a sister bond that a twin type bond but it was right for both of them.

"Yeah well, I just wanted to check." Priya said defensively.

"There's no harm in checking." Seamus said quietly. He would never say it and it wasn't especially obvious but he always stuck up for his littlest daughter. She understood why. The twins were a unit, a real unit, and sometime Priya was very left out of that.

"Mum, Auntie Lavender Flooed earlier. She's coming over later." Caity informed her casually.

"Why didn't you call me when she was in the fireplace?"

"Because when you and Auntie Lavender start talking you end up there for hours and she's coming over soon anyway so really we were just saving you aching knees." Darcey said in a tone which implied it should be obvious.

They had a point. Her and Lavender were best friends. They saw each other every single day and never ran out of things to talk about. She was so glad they had made up all those years ago. The two families were so close. They spent so much time together and they were so similar.

She pulled herself back to the conversation which had continued on without her. She loved them all so much. She watched them silently, smiling to herself. She was so proud of them all. Of Caitlyn, who was the oldest by five minutes but took her oldest sister role very seriously and had just gotten a job working at Gringotts. Of Darcey, who had always struggled to establish herself as an individual but had finally succeeded and had excelled in her NEWT exams and was desperate to go off and travel the world. Of Priya who never complained about being excluded by the twins and who loved more intensely and more devoutly than anyone she had ever known and who would do anything at all for her family. Of Seamus who worked so very hard to provide a good life for them all and who still looked at her the same way as he first had all those years ago. Of them all. She loved them all so much. They were her family, loud and imperfect and rowdy, and she loved them all so very much.

They were in Italy when the news came through. They'd travelled extensively but Italy was definitely their favourite place to be. The Italian wizards and witches were fiery and impulsive and incredibly generous. They loved everything about the country – the people, the food, the scenery, the lifestyle. They were even considering staying here full time.

They had been sitting at a little cafe bar, the whole family – George, Luna, Coraline, Jem, Daniel, Evie and Jacob – chatting very loudly and drawing curious glances from passersby.

Coraline was arguing with Daniel about something or other. Luna and Jem were deeply engrossed in a conversation about magial ethics, something Jem felt very strongly about as of recently. Evie was eating ice cream like her life depended on it and four year old Jacob was busily colouring in his new colouring book, scribbling all over the lines and concentrating so hard his tongue was sticking out.

George himself was reading the newspaper. He had given up a lot of things to travel but the one thing he insisted on was the Daily Prophet and uninterrupted time to read it. (He usually got the paper but rarely got the silence he needed to fully enjoy it.)

The news was splashed across the front page and continued throughout about eighty percent of the paper. He read it in a daze and then read all the other articles on it, and there were a lot – famous people giving opinions (he noticed a little picture of a clearly dazed looking Harry giving a very brief statement before stumbling back into his home and chuckled to himself, Harry had never gotten used to being famous), whole columns on what had happened, loads of information on what would happen next.

"Luna." He said quietly.

She looked up curiously – obviously alerted by the tone in his voice – and the conversation around them died down. This was pretty unusual for such a large family but he didn't have time to enjoy the moment.

"Look." He passed the paper to her. They passed it around them, reading it curiously. His family had a love of reading – many an evening went past with every one of them completely silent and engrossed in their individual reading material.

"Wow." She said. "This is big." There was a short pause. "But it doesn't affect us really."

"No." He agreed. "Wonder who will take up the offer though."

"Hermione." They both said in exact unison, they exchanged small smiles.

"Maybe we should go home...you know, back to England...just for a bit." He suggested. They didn't really have a home anymore. They just drifted from place to place entirely on a whim. When Jem had asked what a pyramid was once, they had Apparated off to Egypt and spent a whole summer there to show him exactly what such a thing was. Coraline loved Paris and had already decided that she was marrying a French man when she grew up and so they visited regularly. Luna had a fondness for the Amazon jungle so they had spent a whole, sweaty, sticky year there before deciding that the humidity was definitely too much for the red headed, pale skinned members of the family, let alone the remaining blonde members.

"Probably." Luna agreed dreamily. "Because we also need to tell your mum we're having a sixth baby."

There was another silence.

"What?" George blinked stupidly.

"I'm pregnant." Luna said, completely unaware of the bombshell she had just dropped.

And just like that the bombshell exploded. They were all laughing and joking and congratulating each other and teasing him for not knowing and hugging. He pulled Luna in to him for a kiss.

"I love you." He whispered in her ear.

She smiled up at him. "I love you too."

"You know what this means though." He said seriously.

"No."

He grinned mischievously. "We're gonna have to think of another name."

"Oh." She seemed unconcerned. "We'll just let them decide." She gestured to their five children who were already speculating about their new brother or sister excitedly, all sitting on top of each other apart from Jacob who was standing on the table so as to be part of it all.

"Jemima!" This suggestion was from Coraline who had just discovered the Muggle Beatrix Potter's books and loved them dearly despite being eighteen years of age.

Jem chimed in with, "Sampson!"

"No," Evie cried. "Let's call the baby Hazel."

Daniel shared a smirk with his father before saying quite seriously. "Martin." It was worth it for Luna's look of absolute horror.

Jacob stood up on the table. "Baby Jacob!"

"But you're Jacob." Evie reminded him. "You can't have two Jacobs."

"Can." The four year old insisted stubbornly. "I am Big Jacob and the baby will be Little Jacob." He sat down again on the table, convinced of his own unshakeable logic.

"I still prefer Jemima." Coraline said mulishly.

Luna turned to her husband, the children still arguing over names. "This is going to be a nightmare, isn't it?"

"Oh yes." He assured her. "Most definitely." And he wouldn't want it any other way.

Harry had found out about the end of the marriage law before nearly everyone else. All the papers wanted him to make a statement. Even after all these years he found it hard to accept that he was a public figure and that people wanted his opinion on everything that happened across the country.

They had been settling down to dinner – just him and Ginny. She had just retired from her job as Chaser with the HolyHead Harpies after fifteen years with the club. She was thirty six now and in her own words 'far too old to be knocked off my broom every day'. She'd played solidly for most of those years, only having time off to have kids.

They'd had three kids – James, Albus and Lily. The names were pretty much a given really. He had wanted another to add to their brood - he wanted to use Remus as a middle name – but Ginny had put her foot down. She had told him in no uncertain terms that she was absolutely not 'lugging a baby around for nine months' before 'squeezing it out of a place that is absolutely not big enough for a baby to get out of'.

Although Ginny was giving up her position as a player, this was still a celebration. She had been asked to join the management as a coach and she had accepted instantly. She couldn't give up her devotion to the club and had always been interested in coaching.

They had been tucking into dessert – treacle tart, his favourite - when a huge commotion started. Half a dozen journalists appeared outside, banging on the doors and chattering excitedly amongst themselves. What was going on?

He was told of the news and asked for a statement. He gave one very quickly – he was becoming accustomed to giving statements (although he always wondered why on earth people would care what he had to say about anything), he usually just said exactly what he thought before getting out of there.

He went back in to his wife. She was waiting for him with an amused smile. He noticed out of the corner of his eye that his dessert was suspiciously absent.

"The law. It's...it's ended." He told her quietly. He was shocked. Although Percy had won Minister, he had been concerned that there would be difficulties in ending the law. It seemed that Percy Weasley had wasted no time – he had only been elected two weeks ago – in ending that awful law.

"Thank Merlin for that." She said quite loudly. "It's about time." Her smile turned wicked. "At last I can get rid of you."

He smirked and drew her close to him, tucking his arm around her waist. "Oh yeah? You really want to do that."

"Abso-bloody-lutely."

"When you say things like that it just reminds me exactly whose sister you are." Harry smirked.

She winced, "Oh go away."

"Never." He said in a tone which was a fraction too serious for the conversation.

She smiled serenely. "Good."

He kissed her. "Now that's all settled... let's move onto exactly what happened to my treacle tart."

She threw her head back and laughed happily, pulling away from him. "It disappeared!"

"Oh yeah." He said moving towards her.

She realised she was backing herself into a corner and made a move to run; he caught her by the waist, dipped her and kissed her soundly.

Percy Ignatius Weasley had never thought he would be the Minister of Magic. He had always been fairly content to be Secretary to the Ministry when he was younger but a position had come up in the Law Enforcement Offices (the administerial side – he wasn't up to being out in the field) and he had applied just on a whim. He'd gotten it and been climbing up the corporate ladder ever since. He'd worked in pretty much every Ministry department in some form or the other over the last eighteen years. Finally, he'd gotten to be Deputy Minister and when the old Minister retired, he had decided to apply for the post. He had won with an overwhelming majority, largely because of his biggest campaign promise.

He would end the marriage law.

He had won his election and became Minister of Magic.

Just three weeks later, he made good on his promise. It hadn't taken much persuasion, so many of his senior colleagues believed it was good and time. He had made the announcement just three hours ago.

He sat back in his chair, in the office that had once been home to so many ex Ministers, and allowed himself a brief satisfied smile.

There was a quiet knock on the door.

"Come in!" He called. He already had a fair idea of who it was.

Cho entered. "I just heard the news!" Her face was glowing. "I didn't think you were doing it so quickly."

He got up to embrace her and kiss her cheek. "I didn't want to waste time delaying the inevitable. Better sooner rather than later."

She sighed and opened her bag. "This came through." She took the seat opposite his desk without being asked and he took his own chair.

She placed a thick wad of paper on his desk.

"Divorce papers." She told him. "My office drafted them this morning so obviously we've got the very first ones here. They're going out to the general public tomorrow morning. I did them personally so I can assure you they are completely correct."

"I'm sure they are." Cho had studied Magical Law as a mature student before getting a job at a high flying law practice. She was incredibly good at what she did and juggled a fantastic career with supporting his own career and being a wonderful mother to their three children.

"Well, I've signed my bits." She said matter of factly. "You need to sign here, here and here." She pointed at the relevant dotted lines which were spread across five different pages. "They're a bit more complicated than Muggle divorce papers because it needs to end the contracts as well as just the physical marriage. They were a nightmare to get right, particularly with those attraction charms...I'm not one hundred percent sure some of the charms won't linger very faintly for some couples..."

She trailed off as he signed his name on each of the lines.

"I guess we aren't married anymore." She said quietly.

"Nope."

They both grinned at each other.

"It'll be so much easier now." Cho said in a relieved tone. "We won't have to sleep together."

Percy pulled a face. "Exactly. We can be best friends without having to see each other naked all the time."

Cho laughed. "Oh come on, you enjoyed it."

He smirked. "It's been a good run, Chang."

"That it has, Minister." She paused and bit the corner of her lip. "You did mean what you said...about living together still, didn't you?"

He nodded. "Of course. You are my best friend, Cho, and we have a lot of history together. You're still going to be a huge part of my life, even if you are now no longer my wife. You're the main reason I decided to end the law."

"What?" She said curiously. "Me? How?"

"I love you, Cho, not in a romantic way but I do love you an awful lot. I want you to have the chance to meet someone new, to fall in love, real love, and to have enough time left to you to enjoy being in love. You couldn't do that with me. I wanted you to have a chance at love."

She flew across the desk to hug him. "I do love you, Percy Weasley. You're a good man."

"Well yes." He said mockingly. "I am the Minister now, you know."

"Don't you think it will be awkward...you know, living in the same house and...seeing other people." She ventured timidly.

He thought for a moment before replying. "Considering my new role...I don't think dating will be at the top of my priorities list but as for you, well I don't care who you date...as long as he's good enough for you, I do now have access to private hitmen. For those suitors that are not good enough." The corners of his mouth twitched up into a wicked grin.

She swatted at his arm. "C'mon you idiot, there's a party in the Ministry foyer and I think we're the guests of honour."

He mockingly offered her his arm and she took it and off they went to celebrate along with everyone else the eighteen years they had together.

He would never regret marrying Cho Chang. She had become his best friend, his rock, the one person he could always rely on. He loved her just not romantically. He'd ended this law to give her a chance at love. He wanted her to be happy and he wanted a chance at love himself, the right people for the both of them were out there and they would find them. Together.

Her reaction to finding out about the news was rather understated. She merely shrugged; half smiled and continued preparing breakfast for her family. She didn't care. It didn't matter to her. There was absolutely no way her and Dean were breaking up. They were meant to be. This law had been good for them. Dean came downstairs, kissed her cheek and sat down at the table, still a little bleary eyed. She passed him the paper and a bowl of fruit. He took the paper and made a face at the fruit.

"It's good for you." She told him severely.

A loud banging noise and a dull thud sounded the arrival of their children. It was swiftly followed by a crashing sound and then worried, high pitched voices.

Their children. Their miracles.

You see, her first baby – the one she had been a little worried about having – had turned out to be two babies. She had had twins. Just like Parvati and Seamus. She had been so shocked she had been utterly speechless.

And, to add to the coincidence, her and Parvati had fallen pregnant with their third children at the same time and their babies had been born...on the exact same day, within hours of each other.

"What's going on?" She called out. There was a suspicious silence.

Their three children entered all wearing identically angelic expressions.

"What's broken?" Dean asked, not looking up from the paper.

"Nothing." Niamh – their youngest – said innocently. Lavender just nodded. She knew that when she went upstairs later, something would be broken or conspicuously absent.

A loud spluttering sound interrupted her thoughts. Dean appeared to have choked on his coffee.

"What is it?" Lavender said worriedly, moving towards him.

"The law is ended."

"Oh. Well yes." She was far more concerned about the spillage of coffee currently lying on the table and probably seeping into the woodwork as they spoke. If that stained, she was making Dean buy her a new table. She was rather house proud and her family didn't seem to appreciate the need to keep things clean and tidy.

"Great." Grace said unenthusiastically. "Is there any toast?"

"Yeah, I'm starving!" Grace's twin – Harry – chimed in.

"No toast." Lavender said firmly. "There's fruit salad."

Harry groaned theatrically. "Not another health kick again Mum."

"There is nothing wrong with eating healthily." She replied primly, setting a bowl of fruit down in front of him.

The family exchanged glances behind her back. Unfortunately, Lavender as a mother was blessed with eyes in the back of her head and saw the exchange.

"I can see you."

She could sense their bewilderment.

Grace went to speak, she was cut off by Dean. "Don't bother Gracie, your mum knows all. She's pretty amazing like that."

She flashed a quick smile at her husband. He was still the exact same man she had fallen in love with and she loved him just as much as she always had.

She loved them all – Dean, Grace, Harry, Niamh – and she always would. They were her world.

"Morning darling." Her husband drawled as he entered the dining room, sliding into a chair opposite her and reaching for the papers.

"The law has been ended." She told him in an impassive tone. She avoided his gaze deliberately.

Draco was terrible in the mornings. He never got up until about nine and then spent a good forty minutes getting ready and shunning human contact until he came downstairs. She suspected that dumping this on him first thing in the morning had not been the wisest idea.

Whilst he had been sleeping and having a twenty minute shower (he had a thing about cleanliness), she had read the news and gotten the papers offering her a divorce. As of yet, she was undecided as to whether to take it.

She had been with Draco for eighteen years now. Eighteen long years.

Did she regret them? No. Did she love Draco? Yes. Did he love her? Yes.

Had he ever told her he loved her?

No. Not even once. He never even mentioned the 'l' word. Of course he did love her, it was obvious in his words and in his actions but...well, he'd never said it. She often wondered if she were reading too much into him – perhaps he really didn't love her; maybe she was interpreting the way he behaved towards her as love when really he was rather apathetic towards her.

Really she just wanted some reassurance.

She loved Draco with all her heart. She had been happily married to him for eighteen years and they'd had four children together. Her life with him had been fantastic but sometimes she just wanted him to tell her that he wanted her, that he needed her in his life, that he loved her.

Once, Clio had commented on it. She was thirteen years old and had just spent two weeks staying with a school friend. Upon her arrival home, she had watched her parents the whole time, an expression of pondering curiosity upon her face. Katie had noticed, Draco hadn't. Eventually, Clio had confronted her.

"How come you and Dad don't tell each other you love each other? Everyone else's parents do." Clio demanded.

Katie had slowly placed her book on the side table. What could she tell her oldest child? "Your Dad and I love each other very much."

"But how do you know? Why don't you say it?" Clio's blonde eyebrows met in the middle.

"We share the kind of love that doesn't need to be constantly said." Katie said finally. "I know your Dad loves me and he knows I love him." Was it really enough?

"But how come you don't say it?" She persisted.

"I have." Katie said, turning away. It was the end of the conversation and Clio seemed to realise this.

They'd never spoken of it again and Katie had never voiced her concerns to anyone, let alone to Draco. Katie had told him she loved him several times, at first it had been awkward, she'd been embarrassed about saying it. Sometimes, she used to tell him when he was asleep so he didn't really know. Even now, on those rare occasions she did tell him she loved him, she felt like she was losing, like she'd given in first.

Draco had never had the sort of parents who told him they loved him and she could not imagine Lucius and Narcissa ever telling each other they loved one another. It simply wasn't in his nature. The issue weighed heavy on her mind but she doubted it ever even crossed his mind.

Draco had been scanning the article whilst she was lost in her thoughts and both seemed to finish at about the same time.

"Well, have you got those papers?" Draco asked. "I don't think we'll be needing them."

He reached for them and instinctively, she pulled them away.

He frowned. "What is it?"

She drew in a deep breath. "I'm not sure."

"Not sure about what?"

"About us. About everything."

"You...you want a divorce?" His voice was cold and impassive. His face was frozen. To anyone else it would seem as if he did not care. To her, knowing him as well as she did, she knew that it meant in fact the opposite. Draco was a burning mess of emotion right now and he was hiding it the only way he knew how, by faking otherwise.

"I'm not saying that." She said carefully.

"You're not denying it." His demeanour melted for a split second and she saw the panic in his eyes.

She reached out to him in sympathy and grasped his hand. "I'm not saying that I don't want to be with you Draco because we both know I do. I'm just saying that I might want to consider the option of divorce seeing as it's there."

"I don't understand."

Was this it? She thought it probably was. It was time to tell him what was going on with her, why she was considering divorce, why she was feeling this way.

"That's just the thing, Draco, you don't understand and you probably never will." She laughed once humourlessly. "I love you, Draco Malfoy. I love you more than probably anything else in this world. We've been together eighteen years and I wouldn't change those for the world, you've given me four beautiful children and so many amazing opportunities and my life with you has been like a dream. But there's just one thing which makes it so much less perfect. I have absolutely no idea what's going on with you. You don't tell me how you feel about anything, well not about the things that matter, you never tell me what you think of me or how you see me, you never tell the children you love them. It's like you're incapable of love. But you aren't. Of course you love us, it's so obvious. Well, that's what I've been telling myself and the children for years – that you love me and that you love them – but am I just kidding myself? How would I ever know? It's not like you've ever told me. I thought I could put up with it, who needs big declarations right? Well it seems that I do. I want you, Draco. I don't want anything to change, I love you and I love us and I love this family. But what about you?"

She'd barely glanced at him throughout her impassioned monologue so she had no idea of his reaction to it all. It had probably been very out of the blue for him.

"I don't-"

She cut him off fiercely. "If you value my sanity at all do not tell me you don't understand. I've made it about as clear as I possibly can." Much to her horror and acute embarrassment, tears welled up in her eyes. She brushed them away angrily.

He caught her arm. She glanced at him – he looked horrified, that was probably because he had made her cry though, he was a proper gentleman after all. Carefully, he brushed the tears away for her. "I never realised that you felt like this, Kate. I honestly didn't have a clue." He broke off for a moment, seemingly undergoing some kind of internal turmoil. "It's not in my nature...to be all lovey dovey. You know I'm not like that, sweetheart. I can't be like that."

"We all have to do things we don't want to do." She told him, her eyes closed. "Is it really so terrible to just tell me how you feel about me?"

"No. No, of course it isn't."

"So tell me." Her eyes flew open and bored into his. Her hands reached up to grip his, which were cupping her face gently. "Just say it."

"I...I can't." He dropped his gaze and his hands.

She blinked back further tears. "Then I want a divorce."

"Please...please, Kate. Darling, please...don't do this." His cool, calm facade had melted, replaced with a panicked, worried Draco. He was finally facing the very real possibility that he could lose her.

"Why should I stay?"

"Well...well, there are thousands of reasons." He tried.

"Just one would have done." She said coolly. She placed her cutlery neatly in the centre of her plate, dabbed at her mouth with a napkin before placing it carefully on the table and rose gracefully. She went to leave.

She heard his chair scrape back desperately. "Kate!"

She stopped at the doorframe, waiting for his next words.

"You want reasons you should stay? Well I'll give you them. My life without you isn't my life at all. You're the most beautiful woman in this world. You're stubborn and argue with my mother and love wearing awful Muggle clothes but I don't care because nothing you do could ever make me not want you. You're nothing like the girls I knew. Nothing like them at all. And that's a good thing, a really good thing. You're better than all of them. In fact, you're the best person I know and the kindest and the fairest. You make me less of an arrogant idiot and you even make me want to be nice. I work so hard just because I want everything to be good for you. You've given me four children and for that I will be eternally grateful. And well...I love you, Katie. I do."

She didn't quite know how it happened but all of a sudden she was in his arms and they were kissing and laughing and she was crying, or perhaps he was.

She had never been happier in that moment. He loved her. She loved him. Things were perfect.

"Thank Merlin! Thank Merlin. Oh sweet Merlin – I'm free!" Hermione Granger was usually a fairly refined, fairly quiet, unassuming sort of person. However, the news that she would finally be able to divorce Blaise Zabini had tipped her over the edge.

Her five children clustered around the doorway – all in various stages of wakefulness and dress – to watch at their mother, who always seemed so straightlaced, screaming and laughing and dancing around her bedroom.

"Mummy's gone mad." Laurence, her youngest son, said fearfully.

Beatrice, his oldest sister, patted his head soothingly.

"She actually has." Theodore affirmed. "Dad has finally tipped her over the edge."

"I always thought Mum would get to Dad first actually." Elspeth, the middle child, inserted a touch snidely. She had her father's dark hair and eyes and was the only one of her siblings to get into Slytherin. (Her Grandma Zabini had been very pleased at the news and had written her a much larger share in the will as a result.)

"You're kidding right?" Beatrice said disbelievingly. "Dad's a Zabini. And he's got Grandma on his side; you know Mum hates her guts."

"She's never said that." Felix finally spoke up. He was the quietest of all his siblings, the second boy and fourth child and was definitely the most like Hermione. When he spoke, it was such a rare occurrence that everyone just listened.

"That's true." Theodore agreed. "She's always very fair."

"Not like Grandma Weasley." Elspeth smirked. "She hates Grandma Zabini."

"And she doesn't even care who knows it." They all chanted in unison. This was one of Grandma Weasley's well known sayings on the subject of their father and his mother.

"Are Mummy and Daddy getting a div-thingy?" Laurence asked.

Beatrice nodded. "Of course. They've been waiting for this news for years."

"Does this mean I'll have to live in an orphanage?" Laurence asked very seriously.

"Yeah." Theodore said with a wicked grin which Laurence missed.

Laurence's bottom lip trembled and Beatrice smacked Theodore on the arm. "Don't frighten him, you idiot." She scolded in a very Hermione-ish tone. "Of course you don't, Laurence. Things will be just the same. Only Mum will be Hermione Granger now, not Hermione Zabini."

"Will we still live here though?" Felix chimed in gravely. "This is Dad's house, technically."

A silence fell.

Hermione seemed to finally notice her children all looming in the doorway. She settled herself back in her king size bed and opened her arms. "C'mon, everyone in."

They all piled in together, something they had done so very many times before.

"Your father and I will be getting divorced. Everything will stay the same for you, I promise." Hermione told them all, pulling five year old Laurence onto her lap.

"Good." Laurence said, sticking his thumb in his mouth.

"I'm glad." Theodore announced.

"Glad about what?" Beatrice said.

"You and Dad getting a divorce." He said directly to Hermione. "You're not happy married to him. Even though you're not really married well, you don't act like you are. He makes you unhappy."

"And it's pretty obvious he doesn't care for you much either." Elspeth said with a smirk.

Hermione shrugged. "Well...it's hardly a secret that Blaise and I were matched through the law. We both hated each other."

"D'you hate Dad now?" Beatrice asked curiously.

"No." Hermione said honestly. She'd surprised herself with her answer but it was the truth. "For a long while I did really hate your Dad, you know what changed my mind?"

"What?" Theodore asked.

"You five. All of you. I could never hate the man who gave me you five and who loves you as much as he does. From the second he saw you, Theodore, he loved you. And it's been the same for when every one of you was born. And that's what changed my mind. In my book anyone who loves you as much as he does cannot be a bad person."

There was a short silence.

Elspeth broke it with a snide grin. "That's kind of soppy and pathetic, Mum."

Hermione threw her head back and laughed, her children joined in. "True sweetheart. I reckon it was being married to your dad for eighteen years. It guess it just finally sent me mad."

The children exchanged glances and said nothing.

He had never thought that they would be physically capable of maintaining this level of fiery passion for so many years.

They had managed it.

They'd been married for eighteen years and had probably argued at least once for every single day of those eighteen years. It was exhausting. It was exciting. It made them seem weak. It proved they still loved each other. It was wrong. It was so very right.

They argued. It was their thing.

But was it really right? They had discussed it a lot of times before, in between arguments when they were being sweet and loving towards each other. They'd cuddle up and he'd run his fingers through her hair and one of them would bring it up and they'd end up reassuring each other that they did love each other and that it didn't matter.

But did it?

Normal couples did not argue every single day. It couldn't be right. Could it? They did argue a lot but they did love each other a lot. They were both fiery, tempestuous, incredibly passionate people. He was always right and she was never wrong. They were so alike they were just bound to argue.

"What do we do?" He whispered. He didn't know why he was speaking in hushed tones; it felt almost blasphemous to speak at a normal volume though, not when they were talking about this subject. When they were talking about separating.

"I don't know." She whispered back. They were curled up on the sofa. She was practically seated in his lap and his fingers were tangled in her hair and her hands were clutching his shoulders.

"I love you."

"I know. I love you too." He closes his eyes and leans forward to press his forehead against her shoulder.

"I know that as well." He can sense the smile in her voice.

"But...should we?"

"I don't want to." She grips his shoulders even tighter, one hand slipping round to lock around the back of his neck.

"We're not conventional. Maybe we weren't meant to be. I mean we're gonna end up hurting each other, Lissy."

"We're not meant to be together?" She's angry, he can tell. In the eighteen years, she's just gotten better at not yelling. She expresses her anger in vicious, controlled whispers instead. "I don't know two people who are more meant to be together than we are. I love you so much it scares me, okay? We love arguing, thrive off of it. It's a bit twisted but who cares. We're happy and I love you and you love me so don't you dare even think of leaving me."

He draws her closer to him, cupping her face in his hands. "I won't."

"Promise me." She whispers harshly.

"I promise." He closes his eyes and she closes the distance between them to kiss him.

Padma woke at five o'clock in the morning to the beeping of her alarm. Quickly, before it woke anyone else, she turned it off and got up. She flipped the covers back on her bed and made her way silently to the bathroom. She showered and applied moisturiser and a new anti-aging cream she allowed an annoying saleswoman to badger her into buying. She crept back into the bedroom to pick up the clothes she had neatly laid out the night before. She went back to the bathroom to put them on. Underwear, tights, skirt, blouse, jacket, shoes, watch, necklace, ring. She carefully put her make up on, using copious amounts of concealer in an effort to hide the dark circles beneath her eyes. She magically dried her hair, it was too early still to put the hairdryer on, and used a quick straightening charm to ensure it lay neatly. Padma crept along the corridor to the kitchen. She poured herself a glass of a smoothie which promised it counted for three of her five a day and had a list of potential health benefits about as long as her arm. She drunk it quickly, took a vitamin supplement and then removed her already prepared lunch for the fridge, placing it neatly in her bag.

She crept back upstairs and silently checked on each of her children. Jack, the eldest, was sprawled across his bed, the covers practically falling off as usual. He didn't even notice her intrusion. Her daughter and middle child, Rose, was fast asleep as well. She was burrowed deep in the covers and Padma could just see the top of her head under the duvet. Erin, the youngest, was half asleep and mumbled a sleepy hello as Padma checked on her. Satisfied that her children were safe and well, Padma scribbled a quick good morning onto a piece of paper, added a reminder to Jack to not go out unless someone was here to look after Erin, a reminder to Erin to pick her toys up from the living room floor and a reminder to Rose to put the dinner on at 6, ready for when she came home to finish up and left it in a prominent place in the vague hope they would see it and actually follow her instructions. Then, picking up her coat and bag, Padma left the house.

She Apparated just outside the garden gate and arrived at work. She trudged in with all the other half asleep Ministry workers and got into the lift. Her stop was the fifth floor. She moved quickly to her office and sat down at her desk. Her personal assistant made eye contact from the next room but Padma shook her head minutely. She didn't need anything right now. She put her coat away and her bag under the desk and turned her attention to her growing in-tray and the new case notes she'd been given.

It was not until eleven in the morning, in the midst of her midmorning coffee break, that she found out the news.

The marriage law had ended and all couples would be given the opportunity to divorce.

Her friend and colleague, Cho Weasley, slid into the seat opposite her, already talking. "It's going to be a nightmare to organise, logistically. I know Percy set up that new department to take care of it all but we're definitely going to need to help out. Half that department have no law background at all, they won't have a clue. I drew up the contract so that should sort out most of the problems but we're still going to have to hold their hands throughout it all...Padma?"

Padma blinked. "Yes, yes. I know. You and Percy are splitting, of course?"

Cho nodded. "Well yes. We're still living together though. He's my best friend. What about you and Ron?" Cho added tentatively.

Padma bit her lip. "I don't know. We're living separate lives right now but I don't know what that means. I mean I think I still love him but...well, sometimes I just don't know. And there's the kids to think about, they love their dad and they wouldn't want us to split. And I mean...well, it's just easier to stay together, isn't it? I don't know if I want to start all over again."

"You sound like you're in your fifties." Cho teased gently.

"It feels that way sometimes." Padma said tiredly. She was thirty seven years old and thoroughly tired. She was the youngest senior barrister in the country and had worked very hard to get there. It permanently seemed like there weren't enough hours in the day.

"Hey, don't be like that." Cho said lightly. "If you and Ron want to stay together then you do that. You were definitely in love once, you can always get back there. If you think it's time to walk away then no one will judge you for that. There will be hundreds of people out there all in the same boat as you."

"Thanks." Padma said honestly, meeting Cho's eyes. "Really."

"Anytime." Cho said.

Padma finished worked promptly at six o'clock and Apparated straight home. It was as chaotic as ever. Jack was in the hallway looking for his coat and putting his shoes on and fixing his hair in the hallway mirror, evidently preparing to go out (he was currently dating Grace Thomas – much to Dean's horror). Rose was clattering about in the kitchen. Evidently, she had just remembered she needed to put the dinner on meaning that dinner wouldn't be served until much later. Erin ran at her and hugged her, already chattering excitedly about her day.

"Hello darling." She said to Erin. "Mummy's just going to go and change and then we can talk about your day, okay? Rose!" She called. "Hello dear! Could you just set the table as well for me? And Jack, love – your hair is fine, be back by midnight and no funny business." Erin nodded obediently, Jack pulled a face, kissed his mother on the cheek and left just as Rose yelled out a begrudging agreement.

Ron was waiting upstairs for her, clearly in the process of changing out of his work clothes.

"D'you know?" He asked brusquely.

She nodded. "Yeah."

"Well, what d'you think?"

"I think we need to consider it." She said carefully.

"I know." He sighed heavily and sat down on the edge of their bed. "You didn't even say goodbye this morning."

She sighed. "I never say goodbye in the morning, Ronald. You only noticed today because today everyone was evaluating their relationships."

There was a short pause. "How did we get like this?" His voice was despairing.

"I have no idea." She replied honestly. It had been a long time since her and Ron had been her and Ron. Truthfully, real life had gotten in the way. She was busy climbing the career ladder and he was always off on Auror missions that he couldn't tell her about until afterwards and they were trying to take care of three busy kids. They barely had time to think straight let alone to have alone time for the two of them. "I guess we just have to decide what we want to do."

"Well what are the options?" Ron said doubtfully.

"We could separate." She said in a matter of fact tone. "We'll get a divorce, sort out custody agreements, sell the house and split it fifty-fifty. We'll remain amicable for the kids and move on and get our own lives."

"Or?"

"We stay together. We acknowledge that we need to work on our marriage and we do just that. Try and make time for each other, try and remember why we fell in love in the first place, try to get back to how we were."

There was a long silence.

He nodded once. "I think...well I think...I think we should go for...option two. I still think there's something between us. We've been together eighteen years, we can't just throw that away."

"I don't want to start over." She confessed quietly and honestly, releasing a plea from the heart without even really realising it.

"Me neither."

"We have to try, don't we?"

"I think so. We owe it to ourselves." Sometimes Ron was incredibly insightful, this was one of those times, and it never failed to shock her.

"We owe it to what we used to have." She agreed quietly.

It would be difficult to fall in love all over again and perhaps it wouldn't work. Maybe after months they would realise that they really weren't in love again or that they needed something that the other couldn't give or that there was reason they had fallen apart in the first place. But there was a very small chance that they would be able to be in love again and they were both holding on and hoping for that small chance.

Angelina Weasley felt that her life so far had been pretty good.

It hadn't been perfect, not by any means, but it had been pretty good. She had married a good man, a man she loved very much who loved her back and who worked very hard to provide her with a good life. She had three children whom she loved more than anything in the world. She had a good lifestyle.

Of course, there had been little things along the way. She had lost her very first baby and suffered months of agony whilst they tried for another. They had been unable to conceive for a second time, even after Roxanne had been born and they had thought their fertility problems were over, and so had adopted. Carin was Italian, her mother was too young to take care of a baby and no one knew who her father was and so she had been placed in an orphanage. They had been holidaying there when they saw her and Angelina had been smitten. Carin was her child. She had been the very first time she'd seen her. And finally, finally when they thought they would have to adopt again, she had found out she was pregnant with Max. Little Max was a bundle of joy. He was their very own little miracle baby.

She'd read all about the ending of the law, of course. She could hardly miss it anyway. Everyone was talking about it and they were having a giant street party in Diagon Alley right outside her flat. She had gone down to join in with Fred because her husband was incapable of ignoring a party (growing older had not changed him at all, he was still like an overgrown four year old with the same infectious smile and very cunning puppy eyes) but she hadn't really bothered with the sentiment of the celebrations.

She had burned the divorce papers. They had no need of them. They were in love. They had been through so much together and yet, throughout it all they had remained together.

There was nothing in the world that could split them up. Nothing.

"Forever, babe." He said gripping her hips tightly.

"Always." She muttered against his lips.

Lee Jordan was not the type of man to express his emotions openly. He was the leader of the anti-marriage law rebellion group and, as such, was far too busy planning campaigns and avoiding capture and running operations to bother with emotions and feelings.

He certainly hadn't risen through the ranks so quickly to become leader through sitting down and talking about how he felt every five minutes.

He was the fifth leader of the organisation and widely known as being the very best. The media knew all about him – he was a kind of hero figure, the former war hero now turned rebel group leader. They knew who he was. They knew everything about them. He even sent in recorded interviews for them to print. And yet, they had no idea where he was. It was genius. He was infamous. The Ministry hated him – he'd escaped them four times now and had evaded capture now for five years.

Like he said – he didn't do emotion. He didn't have time for it.

And yet, when Lee found out that the law was finally over, he sank to his knees and cried like a baby. All those years of living on the run, constantly moving and always looking over his shoulder. All those years of protest and demonstrations and generally creating havoc. All of it. It was all over. It had all been worth it.

They were free.

Thank Merlin, they were free at last.

He could come out of hiding. He could see his family and friends again. He could live in a real house, one which actually belonged to him, and have actual possessions. He would never ever ever have to marry Pansy Parkinson.

He became vaguely aware, through his tears, that someone was holding him and muttering soothing nothings.

Penny.

Penelope Clearwater. His second in command. Ruthless, persistent and utterly beautiful. She challenged him on a regular basis, she wasn't afraid to argue with him or say when she thought he was being stupid. She had his back throughout and had single handedly saved him from near capture more times that he could even count. She was incredible.

He reached out for her, pulling her to him and wrapping his arms around her waist. He'd wanted to do this for so long, it had never seemed appropriate though. Their relationship would cross so many boundaries. Firstly, he would be possibly jeopardising his position. He had more important things to do than to fall in love. He couldn't afford to lose focus for a moment. Secondly, she was his second in command. That was a big no. And, of course, they could never get married. He was technically engaged to Pansy sodding Parkinson.

They'd came pretty close to crossing those lines a few times before in the past. A stolen kiss once, when she'd saved him from Ministry capture at the very last minute. He'd later put it down to the thrill of the moment. A shared bed moment once, when there was only one bedroom in the house they were staying in. He'd tried to take the sofa but she'd insisted they just share. He'd woken to find them cuddled up together. He'd quickly moved away before she woke and tried very hard not to think about it ever again (unsuccessfully, might he add). An awful lot of hand holding in dangerous situations or desperate times when they thought that all their efforts were for nothing and that the law would never be ended.

Unspoken promises and things they'd never said and things they wanted to do but hadn't.

He pulled her close to him, even closer, and whispered five words in her ear. Five words he'd wanted to say for a long time and five words he'd dreamed of saying every day for the last four years and five words she'd been waiting for for about seventeen years. "I love you. Marry me?"

She whispered one word back. The one word he'd waited years for, the one word he'd imagined her saying over and over and the one word she'd been waiting to say for seventeen long years.

"Yes."

Pansy received the news a day later than everyone else. British citizens living abroad had been informed by owl but, of course, she had ended up with an owl with no sense of direction.

When she finally got the letter she had been waiting for for about seventeen and a half years, she had no idea what to do or say. She froze and read it again. She pinched herself to see if she was hallucinating and then she screamed.

Gabriel came running in, panic evident on his face. "What is it?"

She grinned at him hugely. "Let's get married!"

"What?" He snatched the letter from her hands and a beaming smile crept across his face. He pulled her up and into his arms and spun in a circle.

He set her down on her feet and held her until the room stopped spinning. Then, copying a movement she had dreamed about for years, he slid down onto one knee.

"Pansy Parkinson, we've been together for seventeen years now and living wickedly in sin for fifteen. I do believe it's time to make an honest woman of you." He smirked. She couldn't hold back a tiny giggle. "Would you do me the immense honour of being my wife?"

"Yes. Yes. Yes!"

This had been a really big day for Neville Longbottom.

Firstly, he had been offered the position of Head of Gryffindor House as well as his job teaching Herbology. He had, obviously, accepted and then seriously considered doing a happy dance before deciding against it. He was a teacher, for Merlin's sake. He was a grown adult, this was not the time nor the place.

Instead, he'd Apparated home just to tell Hannah. She was having time off from her work. Her Uncle Tom had passed away ten years ago and had left her the bar in his will. It was doing really well. Well enough that she had been able to hire staff to take over for her whilst she was away.

The second big thing that had happened was that the Ministry had finally ended the marriage law. It didn't really affect Neville – him and Hannah would not be divorcing - but it was still a pretty big event. Him and Hannah had spoken about it but their conversation had been about friends of theirs who would be divorcing and the effect it would have on their children, many of whom he taught at school, rather than the possibility of them splitting.

Neville had already nearly lost Hannah once, he knew what it was like and he knew that he would never let her go again. They had stumbled on their path but they'd gotten back on the straight and they'd been very happy since. These past eighteen years had been the happiest of his life.

They'd had three children, all boys – Evan, Robert and Connor – all of whom were good kids. Evan was currently travelling the world on a gap year. He checked in sometimes via the Floo network, usually unannounced (it was always a big shock for whomever was sitting innocently in the lounge to suddenly look up and find his face in the fireplace) to tell them where he was and what a fantastic time he was having. Despite being constantly worried about him, Neville was pleased Evan was happy. Evan had the sort of chances he, Neville, had never gotten to have.

Robert was in his Sixth Year. He was a Hufflepuff, like Hannah had been, and the resemblance between him and his mother was uncanny. He had her gentle nature and sweet spirit, her kind-heartedness and her smile, her blue eyes and pale skin.

Connor was in his Third Year at Hogwarts and spent much of his time creating mischief with Lily Potter (the youngest child of Harry and Ginny) whom he was almost fated to end up with one day. He was very much the baby of the family.

Well, he had been.

That was the third event of the day and probably the biggest. Hannah had gone into labour. They had never considered having a fourth child, not really. They'd always just wanted the three but when Connor had gone off to Hogwarts, Hannah had suddenly decided she needed another baby. She wanted someone to look after and...well, she loved her boys but it was no secret that she had always wanted a little girl. Neville had been more than happy to comply. It had taken a little longer than expected – something they both put down to their age rather than anything more sinister – but she had fallen pregnant.

It had been a relatively easy labour which Hannah had been very thankful for. And now, looking down at his sleeping wife and the newest member of his family, Neville was glad they had decided to have another baby. Their little Alice Augusta Longbottom.

Their family was now officially complete. In fact, his life was pretty much complete.

Beautiful, loving wife? Happy, healthy children? Dream job?

Check, check and check.

The marriage law had ended leaving a pretty impressive wake in its' path.

Behind it lay many happy couples, both those who had already been in love and those for whom it had helped to find love. Behind it lay hundreds of children, hundreds of bright young things to repopulate the wizarding world and ensure its continued survival. Behind it lay many unhappy people, people who had been married for eighteen long years to people they hated, people who had been forced to make the best of bad situations and for whom, today was the beginning of the rest of their lives.

Today the law had ended. Today, they were free to choose.

**A/N: And that, my darlings, is the end. Marriage, Babies and Hatred has been a huge undertaking and I have loved every second of it. It's taken me an awfully long time to write it and when I first started it, all those months ago (in fact, it was actually years ago!), I never thought it would get this out of hand! I was expecting perhaps fifty chapters, when I got to about chapter ten I realised that this was going to be a hugely long story. I've loved writing this and I hope you've enjoyed it as much as I have.**

**As a separate point, I would just like to say that this is 23 pages long and I have never ever written so much in my life. My wrist is killing me but I think it's all been worth it!**

**I would like to thank everyone who has read this, reviewed this and requested their favourite couple. I have had a phenomenal response to this story and I am just so glad you all enjoyed it so much.**

**At the present moment, this is really the only thing I'm writing and now that this is finished, I think I will be taking a break from writing. I will, of course, be reading an awful lot of fan fiction but when I do return to writing, it will probably be in the Twilight fandom. If you're interested, please do check every so often for new work because I promise that eventually it will be there.**

**If you have any questions at all about M,B&H or about anything at all, then please don't hesitate to ask. Just review or put them in a PM and I will do my best to answer. Whether you want to know why I chose to have a certain couple act a certain way or what my favourite colour is –please just feel free to get in touch.**

**There are a few special mentions I would like to make. To LovelyRoses – who actually thanked me for being born in her last review, unfortunately I can claim no credit, all thanks must go to my parents there. To Lucy Whitters whose rambling reviews never failed to make me laugh. To those people who reviewed regularly – you know who you are and I would love to thank you all individually but I haven't the time or energy, so I'll have to settle for this mass thankyou! For FlutePower and crazywriter101 who guessed about Lee and Penelope. For all those who really did want Hermione and Blaise to be together, I once again say I am so very sorry but it never was going to happen! For all those Ron and Padma fans – I am sorry but they did kind of get a happy ending. For everyone who read those author's notes and urged me on and wished me happy birthday and told me good luck in my exams and expressed their sympathies when I lost my grandfather – you are amazing. For everyone who thought that the last chapter was the very end – I am sorry I tricked you all there, I just couldn't resist. And for everyone who has reviewed – my sincerest thanks. You were my motivation throughout and without you lot, this would never have been finished.**

**Thank you.  
**


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